Court Opinion

ID: 9832391
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 21:52:40.232973+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:46.346841
License: Public Domain

JENKINS, J.
This case was before us on a former appeal upon the same pleadings and substantially the same testimony, and we refer to our opinion in 162 S. W. 1023, for a statement of the facts involved herein.
[1, 2] The issues of law raised by the assignments herein are the same as in the former appeal, except that raised by the second assignment, which is that:
“The court erred in refusing to give to the jury defendant’s special charge No. 1, which is as follows: ‘Unless you find, by a preponderance of the evidence, that the witness C. C. Cantrell sent the plaintiff Walter Lawson to go and look for the noise on the occasion testified to by the plaintiff, you will find in favor of the defendant. This charge is given to you as a part of the law applicable to this case, and you will consider it along with the general charge of the court.’”
It is a sound principle of law that the burden of proof is upon the plaintiff to prove, by a preponderance of evidence, all of the material allegations in his petition; but it does not follow that a defendant is entitled to select a single allegation and require the court to charge the preponderance of evidence as to such allegation, for the reason that it might indicate that the court was doubtful as to whether such allegation had been proven. We do not think, generally speaking, that much importance should be attached to the proposition that a party must prove his allegations by a preponderance of the evidence. The jury hear the evidence pro and con, and from such evidence they either believe or do not believe the allegation; and we think, in a civil case, that it would rarely make any difference in the result whether or not the jury were instructed that they must believe the allegation from a preponderance of the evidence. In this *475case, however, we think the court did not err in refusing to give the requested charge, for the reason that the plaintiff might have been entitled to recover under the allegations and testimony herein, although the foreman Cantrell did not instruct Lawson to try to ascertain what was producing the noise at the time he was injured. The evidence shows that Cantrell had requested the employés generally, including Lawson, to try to locate the noise and what was producing it, and that he had offered to pay any of the employes, including Lawson, who would succeed in so doing. Now, if the other allegations of plaintiff’s petition are established by the evidence, of which the jury were the judges, we think it would not have been necessary, in order for plaintiff to recover, to show' that the foreman instructed him on this particular occasion to make such search. These allegations are, in substance, that it was negligence on the part of appellant to fail to have a guard rail around the machinery, and to allow the platform to accumulate grease and waste, so as to become slippery, and that appellee was trying to locate the cause of the noise at the time of the injury, and that his injury was occasioned by such negligence on the part of appellant.
Finding no error of record, the judgment of the trial court is affirmed.
Affirmed.

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