Court Opinion

ID: 2963852
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2015-09-21 21:16:15.489464+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:42:47.247853
License: Public Domain

USCA1 Opinion

	

                            UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                            UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                                FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT
                                FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT

                                 ____________________

        No. 95-1808

                                   MARK J. PORTER,

                                Plaintiff, Appellant,

                                          v.

                         BANGOR & AROOSTOOK RAILROAD COMPANY,

                                 Defendant, Appellee.

                                 ____________________

                     APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

                              FOR THE DISTRICT OF MAINE

                     [Hon. Morton A. Brody, U.S. District Judge]
                                            ___________________

                                 ____________________

                                        Before

                                 Selya, Circuit Judge,
                                        _____________

                      Aldrich and Coffin, Senior Circuit Judges.
                                          _____________________

                                 ____________________

            James F. Freeley, III with whom James F.  Freeley, Jr. and Freeley
            _____________________           ______________________     _______
        & Freeley were on brief for appellant.
        _________
            Jeffrey  T. Edwards  with  whom  Elizabeth  J.  Wyman  and  Preti,
            ___________________              ____________________       ______
        Flaherty, Beliveau & Pachios were on brief for appellee.
        ____________________________

                                 ____________________

                                   February 9, 1996
                                 ____________________

                      ALDRICH, Senior Circuit Judge.   Mark J. Porter, an
                               ____________________

            experienced brakeman employed by defendant Bangor & Aroostook

            Railroad  Co., injured  his back  on October  1, 1992,  while

            adjusting  a rusty  car  coupler device  that had  previously

            failed to  couple automatically with  another car.   He seeks

            recovery under  the Federal  Safety Appliance Act  (FSAA), 45

            U.S.C.    2,1  a  statute  that  has  been  ruled  to  impose

            liability without  fault, San Antonio &  Aransas Pass Railway
                                      ___________________________________

            Company v.  Wagner, 241  U.S. 476  (1916),  when a  violation
            _______     ______

            contributed in any degree to an  employee's injuries.  Carter
                                                                   ______

            v. Atlantic &  St. Andrews Bay Ry. Co., 338  U.S. 430, 434-35
               ___________________________________

            (1949).  Alternatively, he  asserts injury due to negligently

            defective  equipment, a  typical Federal  Employers Liability

            Act  (FELA), 45 U.S.C.   51,  claim.  In  response to special

            questions the jury found that defendant had violated the FSAA

            but that the failure  was not a cause of  plaintiff's injury.

            With respect to the FELA it found that defendant had not been

            negligent.   After denial of plaintiff's motion for new trial

            on  the two  issues  decided unfavorably,  the court  entered

            judgment for defendant.  Plaintiff appeals.  We affirm.

                                
            ____________________

            1.  "It shall  be unlawful for any common  carrier engaged in
            interstate  commerce by  railroad  to haul  or  permit to  be
            hauled or  used on its line  any car . . . not  equipped with
            couplers coupling  automatically by impact, and  which can be
            uncoupled without the necessity of men going between the ends
            of  the cars."  45 U.S.C.   2 (1893) (repealed 1994) (current
            version at 49 U.S.C.   20302).

                                         -2-

                      Plaintiff's  appeal is  devoted principally  to the

            FSAA action where he faces the substantial obstacle of a jury

            finding of no causal connection between the violation and the

            injury.   Recognizing this burden,  he takes the  bull by the

            horns and argues  that, the violation and  injury having been

            established,  the jury not merely should  have found, but was

            required  to find a causal  connection between them as matter

            of law.

                      Plaintiff's contention takes two forms.   First, he

            says  the jury's  finding  that defendant  violated the  FSAA

            means  that  the  coupling  equipment was  defective.    Thus

            plaintiff  strained  his  back working  on  defective coupler

            equipment; hence he was within the statute.  We do not agree.

            There  is nothing  especially dangerous  in coupling  devices

            themselves, the statutory reach is the coupling maneuver.  As

            the  Court  said in  the early  case  of Johnson  v. Southern
                                                     _______     ________

            Pacific Co., 196 U.S. 1, 19 (1904), "The risk in coupling and
            ___________

            uncoupling  was  the  evil  sought to  be  remedied  . . . ."

            Although plaintiff speaks about having to go between the ends

            of the cars, it was not for coupling,  but in preparation for

            coupling.  One  must go  behind, viz., between  the cars,  to

            align   the   drawbars   before   commencing   the   coupling

            operation2.  If, as  here, the cars are safely  separated and

                                
            ____________________

            2.  Plaintiff himself testified that  the drawbars can swing,
            and  must sometimes be lined up in order to meet, a procedure
            he  performed routinely every day.   See Goedel  v. Norfolk &
                                                 ___ ______     _________

                                         -3-

            not in motion, readying is not coupling, and does not involve

            the special coupling  risks.   What could be  the reason,  or

            purpose, for  requiring special protection  for this isolated

            activity?  It is true that other circuits appear to have read

            the  FSAA  more broadly,  see  Clark  v. Kentucky  &  Indiana
                                      ___  _____     ____________________

            Terminal Railroad,  728 F.2d 307 (6th  Cir. 1984) (collecting
            _________________

            cases),3  but they give  no answer to  our question.   We can

            think of none.  Plaintiff had no FSAA case.

                      Alternatively,  plaintiff  would  find   a  special

            circumstance  in the fact that his act of preparation was due

            to,  and hence the  product of, a  proven coupling violation.

            According to his brief,

                           The   undisputed   material    facts
                      demonstrate  that  plaintiff sustained  a
                      back  injury  as  a  direct  and  natural
                      consequence of  the defendant's violation
                      of section 2 of the FSAA.

                                      . . . . .

                      The  only reason that  the plaintiff went
                      between the  tank car and the  hopper car
                      to  realign the  drawbar on the  two cars
                      was  because  there  had  been  a  failed
                      coupling.

                                      . . . . .

                           There  is causation  as a  matter of
                      law. . . .   Clearly, but  for the failed

                                
            ____________________

            Western Railway Co., 13 F.3d 807, 809 (4th Cir. 1994).
            ___________________

            3.  In  Kavorkian v.  CSX Transportation,  Inc., 33  F.3d 570
                    _________     _________________________
            (6th  Cir.  1994),  the  court  assumed  the  correctness  of
            precisely  our plaintiff's case for the purpose of granting a
            new trial.

                                         -4-

                      coupling, plaintiff never would have gone
                      between the two cars . . . .

            "But for" the previously  failed coupling plaintiff would not

            have  been hurt.  Post hoc, ergo propter hoc (Following this,
                              __________________________

            hence because  of this),  is poor  logic.4   Plaintiff  would

            have our holding that a preparatory procedure falls under the

            FELA change  automatically  to the  FSAA  (no need  to  prove

            negligence)  if the  procedure  was undertaken  because of  a

            previous  failure to couple in  violation of that  act.  This

            would be but a lottery, and purposeless.  It is unacceptable.

                      This  is not to say, of  course, that plaintiff was

            unprotected  during  the  drawbar  adjustment;   he  had  his

            ordinary FELA rights.   The difficulty here is that  the jury

            found no negligence.  Plaintiff's only complaint on appeal on

            his negligence count is the court's failure to give a request

            that assumption of risk was not a defense.  Defendant had not

            claimed assumption of  risk, but only the  partial defense of

            contributory negligence.  The instructions here were correct.

            It is  true that the two  principles can be  confused, but we

            readily accept the court's conclusion that it would  only add

            confusion to "set up . . . [a] straw tiger and then  knock it

            down."

                      Affirmed.
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            4.  See, e.g., Webster's Dictionary, Unabr. 2d ed. 1953.

                                         -5-