47 Ga. App. 386 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1933
The plaintiff in this case contends that the defective construction of a transformer and the* failure to maintain the equipment at the point designated in plaintiff’s petition was the proximate cause of the injury to the plaintiff. He contends that this transformer was an old transformer; that it was defective in that no lightning arrester was placed at either of these poles; that no proper ground-wires were placed there, and that in July, 1930, when in his house in the exercise of ordinary care, lightning flashed and came from this transformer in question and went into his house, and that he was injured and damaged as set out in his petition. He also contends that the house was damaged in the amount of $16.40. The defendant contends that if the plaintiff was injured, it was in no way responsible for the alleged injury, but that if injured, as he contends, the same was an act of God caused by lightning for which the defendant is not responsible. The defendant further contends that it is not liable as it had provided such safeguards against danger as are best known and most extensively used, and that all necessary protection was afforded to avoid casualties which might have been reasonably expected.
The plaintiff must show that the defendant was negligent in some one or more of the ways alleged in the petition, and that the negligence proven was the proximate cause of the injury. The fact of negligence may be proven by direct or circumstantial evidence, and “where circumstances are proven from which reasonable men may fairly disagree as to the existence of negligence, the question is for the jury.” Roanoke Ry. & El. Co. v. Young, 108 Va. 783 (62 S. E. 961). The phrase res ipsa loquitur “is merely a short way of saying that the circumstances attendant upon an accident are themselves of such a character as to justify a jury in inferring negligence as the cause of that accident.” Bennedick v. Potts, 88 Md. 52. It is simply a rule of evidence authorizing the jury to infer negligence on proof of circumstances indicating it. Sinkovitz v. Peters Land Co., 5 Ga. App. 788 (64 S. E. 93); Monahan v. National Realty Co., 4 Ga. App. 680 (62 S. E. 127). Where something unusual happens with respect to a defendant’s property, over which he has control, and by such extraordinary oc
The defendant stresses the contention that the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur could not be applied and that the plaintiff could not recover in this case unless he showed that the casualty complained of could not have happened if reasonable care had been used by the defendant. The rule invoked by the defendant can not apply where superhuman powers are being dealt with; for neither science nor common experience has as yet reached the place where a transformer can be equipped with lightning arresters or any other device which would be entirely effective against all bolts of lightning that the all-powerful God might send along an electric line into a transformer. The Ruler of the Universe might send into electrical equipment a bolt of lightning that not only ordinary care could not control, but that the combined efforts of the entire human race could not prevent from causing a given injury. The rule, therefore, with reference to devices, apparatus, or equipment of
If the jury had accepted the evidence of the defendant, there could have been no recovery in this case, for its evidence showed that it had lived up to the rule just above stated. However, the plaintiff’s evidence was in sharp conflict with the evidence of the defendant on this feature of the case. The plaintiff’s evidence showed that the transformer was on a pole about 35 or 40 feet high, the equipment was between 60 and 67 feet of his kitchen and about 75 feet from the room in which the plaintiff was sitting at the foot of his bed in his home; that he was knocked unconscious and thrown on the floor, and did not know how long he remained unconscious; that the transformer in question was an old-style transformer and was not modern and up-to-date; that it had been used by the city plant near the city hall; and that from the city hall it was moved to a pole in the street near the home of James Crawford. James Crawford swore with reference to the transformer as follows: “They had that transformer down below my house. As to whether during lightning and storms was there any trouble down there — nothing only striking 'and dashing off; of course they. had to work on