Court Opinion

ID: 9732178
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 16:10:47.275247+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:24.480000
License: Public Domain

The following opinion was filed September 11, 1956:
Per Curiam
(on motion for rehearing). We are confronted on the motion for rehearing filed by the defendants Lambert and Zinda with the issue of whether our comparative-negligence statute (sec. 331.045, Stats.) is applicable to the facts of the instant case so as to require a reduction in the amount of damages awarded to the plaintiffs by the judgment appealed from.
While certain of the questions of the special verdict and the jury’s answers thereto are set forth in our original opinion, we deem it essential to set forth questions 10 and 11 of such verdict together with the jury’s answers thereto:
“Question 10. Was Joseph Nechodomu, Jr., negligent for his own safety? Answer: Yes.
“Question 11. If you answer question 10 ‘Yes,’ then answer this question: Was such negligence on the part of Joseph Nechodomu, Jr., a cause of his injury? Answer: Yes.”
By its answer to question 14 (the 'comparative-negligence question), the jury attributed 18 per cent of the total negligence to the plaintiff, Joseph Nechodomu, Jr.
Thus, although the jury, by its answer to question 7, found that Joseph because of his age or tender youth, failed to realize the risk involved in playing in close proximity to the mud mixer and in placing his hand in such machine, it nevertheless found him guilty of contributory negligence. Such findings are not necessarily inconsistent. The jury *327bcould well have concluded from the evidence in the case that this nine-year-old boy, even though he did not realize the risk involved in placing his hand inside the mixer, nevertheless failed to exercise the degree of care which is ordinarily exercised by children of his age, experience, and intelligence.
We deem that our decision in Britten v. Eau Claire (1952), 260 Wis. 382, 391, 51 N. W. (2d) 30, is directly in point on the question of whether the jury’s answers to questions 10, 11, and 14 may be permitted to stand in view of its answer to question 7. We quote from Mr. Justice Gehl’s opinion in the Britten Case as follows:
“While it is true that a child of tender years may not be charged with knowledge of statutory rules of conduct, as were considered in VanLydegraf v. Scholz, supra, and similar precepts, still the jury was warranted in determining, even in the absence of warning and lacking familiarity with a machine of this character, that in exposing himself to the danger of playing about this equipment he did not exercise the degree of care which is ordinarily exercised by children of his age, experience, and intelligence.”
One of the essential elements necessary for the application of the principle of attractive nuisance is that the injured minor, because of his tender age, shall have failed to have discovered the dangerous condition and realize the risk involved. Brady v. Chicago & N. W. R. Co. (1954), 265 Wis. 618, 624, 62 N. W. (2d) 415; James v. Wisconsin Power & Light Co. (1954), 266 Wis. 290, 295, 63 N. W. (2d) 116; and Restatement, 2 Torts, p. 920, sec. 339. However, this does not mean that the doctrine of attractive nuisance never applies where the child is guilty of contributory negligence. This is because the test in determining negligence, and this includes contributory negligence, is an objective and not a subjective one. Therefore, whether the actor did or did not appreciate the danger of the situation may be of no materiality.
*327cThe law of attractive nuisance is but a phase of the law of negligence. It necessarily follows that if the plaintiff child is guilty of contributory negligence our comparative-negligence statute applies. This was the necessary import of that part of our decision in Britten v. Eau Claire, supra, wherein we held that the plaintiff child’s contributory negligence presented a jury issue.
It is, therefore, our conclusion that the trial court erred in entering judgment for the full amount of the plaintiffs’ found damages instead of reducing the same by 18 per cent of the total aggregate negligence to the plaintiff child.
The prior mandate is vacated and the judgment is modified by reducing the damages recoverable by the plaintiff, Joseph Nechodomu, Jr., from $15,600 to $12,792, and by reducing the damages recoverable by the plaintiff, Joseph Nechodomu, from $2,227.60 to $1,826.63, and, as so modified, the judgment is affirmed. The defendants are entitled to tax costs on this appeal. The motion for rehearing is denied with $25 costs to the moving parties.