Court Opinion

ID: 9809644
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 21:19:29.139946+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:51:18.083799
License: Public Domain

Clarkson, J.,
dissenting: Defendant corporation had a retail mercantile business on the first floor, and in connection with same had also a “Beauty Parlor” on the second floor. The steps going up to the “Beauty Parlor” were of wood. Each step had a tread of nine inches and a rise of eight inches. Across the front of each step was a metal strip two inches wide. The surface of each of these metal strips as they lay upon the step was one-sixteenth of an inch higher than the surface of the step. The purpose of the metal strip was to protect the edge of each step from wear.
Cora Bohannon, a young girl, had gone up the steps to the “Beauty Parlor,” and on coming down the steps the steel piece on the edge of the step caught in the heel of her left shoe. She was coming down the steps carefully, as she knew others had fallen on the stairway. She testified, “My heel caught on the steel piece which comes up a fraction above the wood.” She sustained injuries and the jury found, under a charge free from error, that defendant was guilty of negligence, that she was not guilty of contributory negligence, and awarded her damages for her injuries.
I think there was sufficient evidence to have been submitted to the jury. In order that the defendant may be liable for negligence, it is not necessary that it could have contemplated, or even been able to anticipate the particular consequence which ensued or the precise injury sustained by plaintiff. It is sufficient if by the exercise of reasonable care the defendant might have foreseen that some injury would result from its act or omission or that consequences of a generally injurious nature might have been expected. It is said also that it is not required that the particular injury should be foreseen; it is sufficient if it could be reasonably anticipated that injury or harm might follow the wrongful act. Hall v. Rinehart, 192 N. C., 706.
Perhaps the blade of an ordinary knife is less than a sixteenth of an inch, yet it will cut. We have here on this record a piece of steel tacked on wooden steps, leaving a sharp edge, admittedly one-sixteenth of an inch above the floor, like a knife blade. The heel of the young girl’s shoe caught on this sharp blade and she was thrown and seriously injured. I think it is a question of due care for the jury to determine under proper instructions, and not for this Court.
I can see no accident in the matter. It was a known causé, and from the known cause defendant could reasonably anticipate that injury might *761follow. Then, again, from frequent use the steel piece becomes loose and more liable to have the shoe heel caught in it and the person thrown. All this was a matter involving due care for the jury and not a Court to decide. In this cause a learned and experienced judge in the court below thought the evidence sufficient to go to a jury and twelve jurors— selected under the law as men of intelligence and moral character— found the defendant guilty of negligence and the young girl free from blame.
The jury system is a coordinate and right arm of the court, to ascertain facts, and one of the few agencies left to pass on the rights of the average man. Defendant owed plaintiff the duty as an invitee to see that the sharp, knife-like steel was tacked down to the floor in such a manner that the steel piece or blade would not catch a shoe heel and throw a person. The steel tacked down would be firm and would naturally throw a person if the shoe heel caught. At least, all this is a question of due care for the jury and not this Court.
Stacy, C. J., concurs in dissent.