Court Opinion

ID: 9754034
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 19:39:44.17638+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:47.147853
License: Public Domain

Duncan and Lampron, JJ.,
dissenting in part We agree that the issue of whether the defendant was under “a duty to give instructions and render assistance to the plaintiffs in loading on the chair lift” ( plaintiffs’ request 3 ) was a question for the jury, and that the plaintiffs’ request which would have imposed that duty as matter of law was properly denied. See Murray v. Boston & Maine R. R., 107 N. H. 367, 224 A. 2d 66. However, the request was adequate to call attention to the issue, and it was incumbent upon the Trial Court “to fully and correctly instruct the jury as to the law applicable to the case . . ..” Burke v. *49Railroad, 82 N. H. 350, 361, 134 A. 574; Perlman v. Haigh, 90 N. H. 404, 10 A. 2d 228. The Court’s instructions were as follows: “Now they also say that the plaintiffs were not instructed in the proper manner of loading the chairs, and it is up to you to determine whether or not they were so instructed, and furthermore, whether the failure to so instruct was negligent on the part of the defendant through its employees.”
The jury had previously been instructed that the defendant had “a right to assume that passengers using the chair lift would do so in a reasonable and careful manner.” The plaintiffs, in addition to excepting to the denial of their request relating to the “instructions ... in loading on the chair” excepted to the instruction last quoted, upon the ground that “the defendant knew through their failure to give instructions and other circumstances that the plaintiffs were ignorant of the proper manner in which to use the chair and therefore should not have expected them to use it in a proper manner.”
The instructions given did not furnish the jury with adequate standards by which to make the determination submitted to them. There was evidence from which it could be found that the defendant had superior knowledge of the risk that the plaintiffs’ clothing might catch on the safety bars and that its agents should have appreciated that the plaintiffs were unaware of this risk. If it were so found, it could also be found that the defendant had a duly to warn the plaintiffs or give them adequate instructions calculated to avoid the danger. Wheeler v. Railway, 70 N. H. 607, 617, 50 A. 103; Musgrave v. Company, 86 N. H. 375, 377, 169 A. 583. “If there is some probability of harm sufficiently serious that ordinary men would take precaution to avoid it, then failure to do so is negligence.” Tullgren v. Company, 82 N. H. 268, 276, 133 A. 4.
The defendant was entitled to assume that the plaintiffs would use the lift “in a reasonable and careful manner,” only if it had no reason to think otherwise. See Eichel v. Payeur, 106 N. H. 484, 488, 214 A. 2d 116. In view of the evidence, the omission of this qualification from the instruction given was prejudicial and misleading. Because of the inadequacies of the instructions to the jury upon these issues, we are of the opinion that there should be new trials in both cases.