Court Opinion

ID: 9585849
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:04:27.935906+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:24:15.815459
License: Public Domain

Felton, C. J.,
dissenting in part. I concur in the judgment in case No. 35606, and in the judgments on the main and cross-bills in cases Nos. 35611 and 35628. I dissent from the judgment on the main bill in case No. 35624. Assuming for the sake of argument only that the petition alleges acts of negligence against the defendants George A. Fuller Construction Company and Southern Railway Company, such acts of negligence are too remote to be found to have been a proximate cause of the injuries complained of. The alleged negligence of Central of Georgia Railway Company was the sole proximate cause of the injuries. This conclusion is based on the well-known and much-cited principle of law that, under such facts as are alleged in this case, Fuller Construction Company and Southern Railway Company cannot be held liable because their alleged negligence was not the sole occasion of the injury, because it did not put in operation *319other causal forces such as were the direct, natural, and probable consequences of the original act, and because the negligence of Central of Georgia Railway Company could not have been reasonably anticipated or foreseen by Fuller Construction Company or Southern Railway Company. Peggy Ann of Georgia v. Scoggins, 86 Ga. App. 109 (71 S. E. 2d 89), and citations. I think it is conclusively shown by the allegations of the petition that, if the engineer of the Central of Georgia train had complied with the requirements of Code § 94-510 and had come to a full stop within 50 feet of the intersection of the spur line of Southern Railway Company with the main line of Central of Georgia, whatever negligence of which the other two defendants had been guilty could have been discovered and avoided. I do not believe that the other two defendants were chargeable with anticipating the violation of the Code section by Central of Georgia Railway Company. I think the Code section was intended to protect all who were legally and rightfully in the orbit of danger from a collision of two trains at a railroad intersection such as we have in this case, and under the circumstances I think the deceased had a right to be where he was and that the plaintiff is not barred because the deceased failed to anticipate the negligence of Central of Georgia Railway Company and to remove himself from what turned out to be a place of gravest danger.