91 Kan. 138 | Kan. | 1913
The opinion of the court was delivered by
The plaintiff recovered a judgment for injuries received while working at an elevator box in the defendant’s plant. The building was four stories high, and the power running the conveyor belt came from a horizontal shaft on the fourth floor which was so arranged that when the belt of the conveyor worked upon a pulley which revolved with the shaft the power was thereby transmitted, and in order to throw the belt out of gear it was necessary for a workman on the first floor to pull a rope reaching down from the fourth floor, the effect of which was to change the belt over to a loose pulley not revolving with the shaft. To put the belt in gear another rope was provided, by which the belt could be drawn back so as to run over the fixed pulley. The petition alleged, among’ other
The. jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff, and in answer to special questions found that he pulled the rope in the usual and ordinary way for throwing the machinery out of gear before beginning work in the elevator box; that the belt started in motion while he was engaged in cleaning out the box, without notice or warning.
“Q. 14. Did plaintiff throw said drive belt out of gear before descending into said basement? A. Yes. Q. 15. Did said drive belt get into gear automatically after plaintiff went down into said basement? A. No evidence to show how it got back.” It was also found that the plaintiff stated to witnesses that he might have
While the defendant is not entitled to a judgment on the special findings, and while but for the answer to question No. 15 the general verdict might be reconcilable .with the other special findings, the entire conclusions of the jury leave the case in the condition of having found in favor of the plaintiff' while failing to find one of the essential- elements of his right- to a recovery. One ground of a motion for a new trial was that the verdict was contrary'to the evidence, and in
It was alleged and found that the defendant had not furnished plaintiff a safe place in which to work, but it is clear that the controlling cause of such unsafety was the tendency of the belt to shift from the loose to the fixed pulley, and in this instance it was necessary to prove that such shifting occurred without human agency. This — the very crux of the matter — the jury failed to determine.
The judgment is reversed and the cause remanded for further proceedings in accordance herewith.