112 Ga. 620 | Ga. | 1901
The defendant in error, David Jackson, obtained in the trial court a verdict against the Georgia Cotton Oil Company for personal injuries, and it brings here for review a judgment overruling its motion for a new trial. The brief of evidence discloses that Jackson was injured while operating, as an employee of the Oil Company, a machine known as a “ former.” As the case is to be tried again, we leave open the question whether or not, upon the merits, the plaintiff was entitled to a recovery. The judgment is reversed because, in our opinion, the trial judge committed at least two errors which may have been prejudicial to the defendant corny pany.
The case of Pitts v. Railroad Co., 98 Ga. 655, relied on by counsel for the defendant in error, is not authority for the contrary of what is above laid down. It is true that in the first headnote, which was prepared by Mr. Justice Atkinson, there is a loose expression to the effect that an employee injured by defective machinery would not be precluded from recovering damages merely because he knew of the defects therein, when it did not further appear either that he “ actually knew that the continued use of the defective appliance was dangerous, or that the defect complained of rendered the use of the appliance so obviously dangerous as that a person of his intelligence and understanding could readily perceive the danger.” The Chief Justice, however, did not assent to the correctness of the proposition laid down by our brother Atkinson, but concurred in the judgment rendered in that case for reasons which he set forth in a separate headnote; while the writer dissented from the judgment altogether.
Judgment reversed.