Court Opinion

ID: 9830027
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 19:49:47.965041+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:11.220568
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
[25] It is earnestly insisted in appellant’s motion for rehearing that the judgment for §30,000 is excessive. We agree with appellant that it is an enormous sum. But when we consider the undisputed evidence of the suffering and injuries, and after carefully reviewing the record, which reveals no improper testimony, no erroneous instruction, and no improper argument, we are unable to say that the amount of the judgment was the result of prejudice or passion, or that it is not sustained 'by the evidence or precedent. The correctness of this conclusion is made clear by the following quotation from appellee’s brief:
“G. R. Dawson testified: On knocking me down, it threw this left leg across the rail, taking it off above the shoe top (indicating left leg). I caught hold around this axle this way (illustrating), but couldn’t hold on to it, kept turning my hands loose. Then the wheel caught me here on the opposite side (indicating forehead of left side). At that time I threw myself around, and, the dead lever caught me here in the left breast, crushing me and rolling me in about an eight-inch space, probably a little more, but not much; threw me over — it threw this leg in between the wheels (indicating right leg below the knee) and wheel ran over it there (indicating the place on right leg). When they got the train stopped, I had made one complete turn, and the dead lever was just hanging onto me here, across the hip (indicating), from the railing.from here to here (indicating). They pulled me out from under the car more dead than alive. There were two large cuts on my right arm here (indicating), this breast (left) was caved in, and I spit blood and had severe coughing spells for at least five weeks while in the hospital. I was black and blue and couldn’t raise an empty teaspoon in that time; I had to be fed. I lay fourteen months and one-half, more or less, fiat upon my back, and never turning an inch one way or the other, sleeping with the right leg in a fracture box, not even a cast to hold it, and during that time I suffered pain that I couldn’t tell you; I couldn’t begin to describe it. The first three months of my life in that hospital was the awfullest thing, gentlemen, that you ever saw; it was something horrible-having had to undergo all these different operations, having never recovered from it, and I never will. I can’t do anything to-day in the way of labor. I am able to sit down and do the work, but my head isn’t right yet, and the pain I suffer day in and day out is enough to drive nine men out of ten crazy. I am suffering all the time with my abdomen and that side where I was crushed; it is beyond description for me to try to tell you, but I have tried to bear it; I have tried to look upon the bright side of life and carry through with everything, but it will carry that way with me until I am in my grave; I know it. I had been a railroad conductor since 1897. I know and am familiar with the average earnings of conductors working on roads in and out of San Antonio — freight conductors on the I. & G. N., Southern Pacific, Sap, and other roads. Their average earnings will run from §150 to §200 a month, according to the class of service you are in, greatly. I claimed to be an, expert conductor. Before I was injured, at the time I had this particular job, I was earning about $110 or about $115 a month on this job — this work. This road did not pay the standard wages to conductors. Previous to this injury I had run a train in Mexico for a number of years, and my earnings there would average about $170 gold a month, United States currency. Since I have been injured, about the only thing I could do was sitting around the I. & G. N. Hotel office and helping out. I suffer pain now from my heart, my backbone, my kidneys, and the entire right side of my abdomen, and my heart hurts. My right leg is always suffering too — the stump; the same as my left leg, troubles me a good deal; it bothers me on account of the nerves. I don’t sleep well. I go to bed at 9:00 or 10:00 o’clock. I am awake every morning at 3:30 or 4. I wake up with a kind of nervous shock, and it wakes me. Then I begin to twist around; I don’t get much rest. I have to get up to urinate two or three times a night on an average, and I have pain with it; my kidneys hurt and my urine burns my urethra and bladder. My left side over my heart was mashed; the condition I found was, when I took a long breath my chest was crushed in. I spit blood, as near as I can remember, about five weeks. As I stated, there were cuts and bruises over my body and limbs. In the first place, these were all skin abrasions through here (indicating), what I say (indicating side of the head and front of the ears), and this side was all skinned, and abrasions on my right arm between my elbow and wrist, two long cuts paralleling each other. My left chest was crushed in on my lung, my ribs about the right side were all crushed and bruised, and my right hip seemed tom loose almost; it was torn loose from the bone in, the way it felt, it hurt so. My back was all sore. I suffered with it, and I suffer now with my back, with pains of the muscles all along each side and joints in the vertebrae, and through the small of the back here (indicating). It is sore, always has been; never got over it. Before *255this accident mj; hearing was good. Now it is no good — it is impaired; my hearing is nothing like I had. My eyesight was good; I have to use glasses now to read and write. When this accident happened, I was forty-five years of age. When I use glasses, I can read about an hour, and the effect it is blurs on my reacting and the lines run together. My strength now, compared to what it used to be, is poor. Before this accident I claimed to be an A No. 1 man, physically strong and healthy. My heart affects me when I get out and maye around. If I take a little walk — a long walk— it goes to thumping on me and gets me all out of breath; and then if I overexert myself during the day, then I have pains at night there also, from that lung there, which is causing me trouble. After I was taken to the hospital, I lay fiat on my back fourteen months and a half. I was in the hospital altogether seventeen months. They performed four operations on my legs. They performed one operation on the left leg, that is when they cut it off, and performed throe operations on the other leg. Q. What did they do in those three operations? A. They cut out the bone in the first operation, the first time; and dressed the leg up and took out the bone. Q. That was the right leg? A. Tes, sir; that was the right leg. And then along about the 6th of March I went under the other operation; that was the right leg, and they taken out a great big piece of the shin bone in here, (indicating). Q. Well, was there any suffering about that? A. Oh, yes; suffering. , Heavens! I couldn’t tell it; it is beyond my expression. The third operation was in July following, when they had to cut off some more bone up in here (indicating right leg), that was diseased. I was a long time getting over that operation; the ansesthetic I took in that operation, hurt my lungs a good deal at that time. I was a long time getting over that. Q. Now, will you please show the jury the Condition of those legs? A. Tes, sir; I guess I will have to take off my clothes, won’t I? Q. Tes, sir, so they can see — just let them see both legs. (Witness removes his clothing about his legs and the jury examined both, legs.) I haven’t got any use of that foot at all (indicating right foot). This is the first time that front has healed up in over three years (indicating on right leg); just a little pus comes out of the back part yet. Q. Is there any there now? A. Tes, sir; a little (wiping leg). That wound goes entirely through the leg; there was a drainage tube went through there from here to here (indicating) — went entirely through my leg.
“Doctor Berrey testified: As to what I find his condition to be — wdl, he has had an amputation of the left leg. He evidently had a fracture of the right leg about here (indicating), probably a little below the middle of the third bone, and I judge from the condition of the leg that there must have been quite an amount of bong removed. It is still unhealed yet; it is open and still suppurating; still having a secretion of pus there, and I find at present to-day he has a pulse rate of 120 to the minute, and that his breathing is too fast. The normal pulse rate is about 60 to SO. He suffers pain in the right side just above the groin, just about here (indicating). Those were about the conditions. The left leg is amputated about six inches below the knee, as well as I recollect —that is about the place of amputation. I have examined the other leg from which the hone has been removed, and as to the danger of its breaking and giving way with, that amount of bone taken out, I will say that he has got a large amount of hone out, and any sudden jar, any misstep, anything of that kind, with such a small amount of bone there, is liable to fracture it in that locality, and if it did, it would be a very serious matter. The leg is bad at that point; the discoloration is bluish in color, and to repair a broken’ bone at that particular point would be a very difficult matter. It might possibly result in amputation if he had a re-breaking at that point. There is quite a large cavity in that leg where this bone has been taken out; I didn’t measure it, but quite a cavity — about so long, I suppose (indicating). It is in a kind of convex form, scooped out, you might call it — a cavity. The leg is deformed there. The amount of weight he could put on that leg with safety I couldn’t say, as I remarked a while ago, but I think, with the little bone left there, any undue exertion, any misstep, anything of that kind, might break that bone at that particular place, because there is where it is weak, and if he did, if he couldn’t get union, there would be nothing left for him except amputation. This overworking of the heart and rapid beating, if it keeps up, will in time lead to organic trouble — that will in time lead to heart trouble. AVith reference to the evidence of pain, suffering on the right side here about the groin — just what that is I have never been able to make out definitely; I must say I don’t know; but every time I have seen him he has .complained of pain on the right side, and every time that I have seen him he has had difficulty in breathing, and also I have noticed the heart’s action, the rapidity of it. These conditions are independent, of course, of his amputated limb and the condition that I found in the other limb as I have described it. Independent of the two bad legs, I would not regard him as able to do manual labor as long as his heart is in the condition it is in now. If he had two perfectly good legs, and a heart running 120 to the minute, continuously, that itself would incapacitate him for manual labor. Where the heart beats that fast it deteriorates the strength of a man, because the more rapid his heart beats the more rapid he breathes; breathes more rapidly.”
Two of defendant’s surgeons had been constantly treating the plaintiff since Ms injuries and they were not called upon to testify. If it is possible to inflict injuries upon a human being that damage him to the extent of $80,000, the verdict cannot be held excessive. One leg is gone; the other is in a condition which, had the court seen the leg, it would agree with us, is worse than amputation. The car wheel went over the right leg and crushed it so badly that saving it from amputation was miraculous. Three severe operations were required, and the bone taken out to such an extent that any misstep may cause the breaking of the limb. More than three years after the injury the wounds are still exuding pus, and the leg is deformed, and movement of the foot prevented. The testimony shows that the plaintiff’s mind has been impaired, his chest and body mashed and crushed, his back weakened and full of pain. His internal organs refuse their proper functions, and the agony that he has suffered and is suffering and must always suffer is beyond description. The plaintiff was comparatively a young man and had a large earning capacity. Fifteen years of his ordinary earning capacity would have amounted to the verdict given, to say nothing of the exquisite agony that he must always endure. The plaintiff is in a worse condition than a man who has lost two legs.
*256In the ease of Railway v. Shelton, 30 Tex. Civ. App. 72, 69 S. W. 653, it was held that $35,000 was not excessive for the loss of two legs.
In the case of Railway v. Kelly, 34 Tex. Civ. App. 21, 80 S. W. 1073, the syllabus says:
“In an action against a master for injuries to a servant, 54 years of age, it appeared that plaintiff’s injuries were to the back and spine, and a concussion of the spinal cord, and had resulted in total paralysis of his lower limbs; that he suffered great pain; that his eyes and digestion were affected, and that the pain kept him awake; that he had shown no improvement within a year, and that it was the opinion of physicians that the paralysis was permanent. It was shown that prior to the injury he had been earning from $100 to $125 per month. held, that a verdict of $30,000 was not excessive.”
In the ease of Railway v. Gray, 137 S. W. 729, the Austin court held that $30,000 was not excessive compensation for a railroad' brakeman paralyzed from the hips down.
In the case of Railway v. Webster, 99 Ark. 265, 137 S. W. 1103, 1199, Ann. Cas. 1913B, 141, the syllabus says:
“$35,000 is not excessive recovery for personal injury to a railway trainman, 35 years old, who was previously in perfect health, where the injury has caused lateral curvature of the spine, intense pain, and permanent incapacity, physical and otherwise.”
This court held that $30,000 was not excessive damages for a boy whose face and hands were mutilated and who was rendered almost blind by an explosion. Waters-Pierce Co. v. Snell, 47 Tex. Civ. App. 413, 106 S. W. 170.
In Railway v. Matkin, 142 S. W. 604, the Austin court held $35,000 not excessive compensation for the loss of both legs below the knees.
The Supreme Court of South Carolina, in Huggins v. Railway, 96 S. C. 267, 79 S. E. 405, held that a verdict of $40,000 was not excessive where a railroad engineer 35 years old was permanently disabled and confined to his bed.
In Yurkonis v. Railway (D. C.) 213 Fed. 537, it was held that $36,000 was not excessive damages for injuries causing loss of sight to a coal miner 50 years old.
In Zibbell v. Southern Pac. Co., 160 Cal. 237, 116 Pac. 514, the Supreme Court of California held that $70,000 was not excessive compensation for the loss of one leg and both arms.
In the case of Reeve v. Electric Co., 152 Cal. 99, 92 Pac. 99, the Supreme Court of California sustained a verdict of $30,000 where the plaintiff was severely burned by an electric wire.
In Railway Co. v. Waits, 164 S. W. 870, the Texarkana court upheld a $35,000 verdict where a young lady lost both legs, one at the ankle and one below the knee.
The motion is overruled.