Court Opinion

ID: 9460716
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 21:58:26.178295+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:36:45.007079
License: Public Domain

FAIRCHILD, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
I cannot agree with the majority that the defendant was obligated, under the law of Illinois, to exercise the highest degree of care in its ticket-selling operations at O’Hare Field. However, even if the district court erred regarding the standard of care, under the circumstances that error was harmless. In addition, I believe that the record justified a contibutory negligence instruction. For these reasons, I respectfully dissent.
The majority bases its holding that the plaintiff was entitled to the highest degree of care on a determination that *618she was a passenger at the time of her injuries. However, “[t]he degree of care is not fixed solely by the relation of carriers and passengers; it is measured by the consequences which may follow the want of care.” Davis v. South Side Elevated Railroad Co., 292 Ill. 378, 127 N.E. 66, 68 (1920). See also Sims v. Chicago Transit Authority, 4 Ill.2d 60, 122 N.E.2d 221, 223 (1954). In Davis, the court held that ordinary care was the proper standard where plaintiff slipped descending the stairs outside a train station.
The Illinois Supreme Court reaffirmed its adherence to the Davis/Sims rationale in Katamay v. Chicago Transit Authority, 53 Ill.2d 27, 289 N.E.2d 623, 625 (1972): “[T]he degree of care should be commensurate with the danger to which the passenger is subjected, and the degree of care required to be exercised increases as the danger increases.” In Katamay, plaintiff, moving toward a train, suffered injuries when the heel of her shoe wedged in a gap in the wooden station platform. The court held that, in boarding, she was entitled to the highest care. Similarly, in Zorotovich v. Washington Toll Bridge Authority, 80 Wash.2d 106, 491 P.2d 1295 (1971), cited in Katamay for the factors defining a passenger, a vehicle proceeding down a ramp to defendant’s ferry struck plaintiff as he crossed the ferry dock to purchase his ticket. The court held that he was a passenger and entitled to the highest degree of care. Both Katamay and Zorotovich are consistent with the principle that the degree of care should be commensurate with the degree of danger: The rush to board a train during a brief stop or the need to cross the path of autos loading onto a ferry involve special hazards peculiar to the operation of the respective carriers.
In the present case, the negligence plaintiff alleged arose from TWA’s procedures for accepting credit cards and the claimed lack of courtesy and diligence of its ticket agents. Whatever perils there may be in employing rude or inefficient persons to meet the public, those perils are not infected with the unique hazards generated in the operation of a common carrier. The risks of delay and frustration to which plaintiff was exposed in purchasing an airline ticket were no greater than those she might have encountered in transacting business at a retail store. Thus, in the ticket-selling phase of its business, TWA had only to exercise ordinary care in the treatment of its customers.
Even if the district court incorrectly charged the jury as to the degree of care, I do not believe that reversible error occurred. The testimony conflicted regarding the events preceding plaintiff’s illness. Plaintiff testified that TWA’s employees were uncooperative and spoke to her in a loud and abusive fashion. Defendant’s witnesses, on the other hand, stated that they dealt with plaintiff in a pleasant manner, and their testimony tended to show that they made reasonable efforts on her behalf. The jury, in reaching a verdict for defendant, apparently accepted defendant’s version. It is, therefore, unlikely that the standard of care instruction had any impact on their deliberations. When the facts which the jury must have found in reaching its verdict render an erroneous instruction irrelevant, the error is harmless. See Baynum v. Chesapeake and Ohio Railway Co., 456 F.2d 658, 659-660 (6th Cir. 1972) 1
It is, of course, possible that the jury concluded TWA had acted improperly; that the misconduct did not violate ordinary care; but that, had they been instructed under the highest care standard, they would have found a breach. I think, however, that this hypothesis is improbable. In its practical effect on jury deliberation, the difference between the two standards may be, and seeming*619ly was here, too small to justify reversal.2 One commentator has, in fact, suggested that there is in reality but one standard of care, “ordinary prudence under the circumstances, and the greater danger, or the greater responsibility, is merely one of the circumstances . . . .” W. Prosser, Law of Torts § 34 at 184 (3rd ed. 1964). In light of these considerations, any error in the instructions was not “inconsistent with substantial justice” and was, therefore, harmless. See Rule 61, F.R.Civ.P.
Finally, I do not agree with the majority’s conclusion that the record failed to support a contributory negligence instruction. Under Illinois law, plaintiff had the burden of pleading and proving the exercise of due care for her own safety. See, e. g., Green v. Brown, 8 Ill.App.3d 638, 291 N.E.2d 18, 19 (1972). Whether plaintiff has established freedom from negligence is normally a jury question. Green, 291 N.E.2d at 19-20. The trial judge may withdraw that issue from the jury only when “all of the evidence, when viewed in its aspect most favorable to the opponent, so overwhelmingly favors movant that no contrary verdict based on that evidence could ever stand.” Pedrick v. Peoria and Eastern Railroad Co., 37 Ill.2d 494, 229 N.E.2d 504, 513-514 (1967).
The evidence in the present ease did not meet this test. The district court’s observation to counsel, apparently out of the jury’s hearing, that “the fact that she wanted to take a trip under those conditions is evidence of contributory negligence” may not reflect a sound basis for a contributory negligence instruction. However, plaintiff did admit that her doctor had admonished her not to walk for a few days. There was testimony that, immediately prior to her collapse, plaintiff said to a TWA ground hostess: “Where is United Air Lines? I don’t want to go. Take your wheelchair back.” Plaintiff then suddenly rose up from the wheelchair and simultaneously suffered a heart attack. On this evidence, the jury could have concluded that plaintiff, contrary to her doctor’s warnings, was attempting to walk, and that this act constituted negligence contributory to her illness. Considering the burden was plaintiff’s to establish her own exercise of care, the record is not so overwhelmingly favorable to her on that issue that it precluded jury determination.
I would affirm the judgment below.

. Cf. Kube v. Bethlehem Steel Corp., 390 F.2d 506, 509-511 (3rd Cir., 1968) (district court’s failure to give highest degree of care instruction harmless in light of record supporting jury’s verdict for defendant).

. Cf. Lynch v. Travelers Indemnity Co., 452 F.2d 1065, 1067 (8th Cir., 1972).