13 Kan. 191 | Kan. | 1874
The opinion of the court was delivered by
This was an action for damages for personal injuries. The facts as claimed are that defendant in error crossing Third street bridge in the city of Wyandotte was startled by a runaway horse, and stepping quickly one side to avoid him slipped her foot into a hole in the bridge, was thus thrown down, and injured. The jury found for the defendant in error, and assessed her damages at $1,200.
“ 1st.-Was the plaintiff injured, if at all, twenty steps from the north end of the bridge and about four or five feet from the east side thereof?
“2d. — Was there any defect in the Third-street bridge twenty steps from the north end, or thereabouts, showing carelessness or negligence on the part of defendant?
*196 “3d.-Was the plaintiff frightened at the time the accident complained of happened?”
Since 1870 it is the duty of the court, at the request of either party, to instruct the jury, if they return a general verdict, to find upon particular questions of fact, to be stated in writing, and direct a written .finding thereon. (Laws 1870, p. 173, §7.) But it does not follow from this that it is the duty of the court to submit to the jury every question that may be presented, and compel a finding on it. That, in some cases, and with some attorneys, would cumber the record with a fearful mass of useless stuff. Only those questions need be be presented that bear upon facts material to the issues, and whose answers may in some way control or affect a general verdict. It is useless to compel a jury to answer a question whose answer, whatever it may be, can have no bearing upon the general verdict. So also is it useless to submit a question at the instance of one party which has already been submitted at the instance of the other. In this case the jury were asked, at the instance of the plaintiff, this question: “Was the plaintiff materially injured by falling on Third-street bridge in the city of Wyandotte by reason of defect in said bridge on or about the 5th of August, 1871?” and answered “Yes.” They also answered in reply to plaintiff’s question that the bridge was defective or unsafe at the time, and that the defect had existed long enough for notice thereof to the city. The only point in which the questions of defendant differed from those of plaintiff was that in the former the inquiry was limited to a single spot on the bridge, while in the latter it extended to the bridge as a whole. If the jury having received the excluded questions had answered them in the affirmative, of course there would be no^pretense of conflict; if in the negative, nothing to disturb the general verdict, for if the plaintiff was injured by a defect in the bridge, it mattered nothing that such injury and defect were not at a particular spot thereon. It is true the plaintiff in her testimony located the place of injury at the spot indicated by defendant’s questions; but there was testimony tending to show the exist
While the testimony was conflicting, there was enough to sustain the verdict. The judgment will be affirmed.