66 S.E. 315 | N.C. | 1909
The plaintiff sued to recover damages for personal injuries received by the feme plaintiff, C. B. Monroe, under the following circumstances: On Sunday night, 14 June, 1903, the plaintiff was returning to her home from service at the Presbyterian Church, and, while walking through a vacant lot of the defendant, in the town of Fayetteville, fell into a pit and was severely and permanently injured, breaking her leg and some of her ribs, and otherwise injuring her. The path along which she was walking was about eight feet wide and was clearly defined. The path traversed diagonally an unused lot of the defendant, was unlighted at night, and furnished a nearer approach to plaintiff's residence. A large number of people used this path, and had been accustomed to use it for their convenience, by night and day, for more than two years prior to plaintiff's accident. The plaintiffs had been using it, both night and day, since the previous spring, and weeds and shrubs had grown up around the borders of the pit, that concealed it from sight, and the plaintiff C. B. Monroe did not know of its existence. The pit was left uncovered more than two years before plaintiff's injury, when a house for the repairs of engines was removed. It was near the path — so near that a person traveling the path and unaware of it might by a misstep fall into it, though the path diverged at this point from its course to go around the pit. It was several feet deep and its bottom was covered with logs.
The defendant offered no evidence, but moved the court to nonsuit the plaintiff, which motion was denied, and thereupon requested the judge to charge the jury to answer the first issue, No, which was *364 (375) refused, and further requested his Honor to charge the jury as follows: "The court charges you that, as a matter of law, the defendant owed the plaintiff no duty, except that it should not wantonly or willfully injure her, and there is no evidence in this case that the injury, if any there was, was done wantonly or willfully." This instruction was refused.
There was no exception to the charge of his Honor, and the case is presented upon the exception taken to the rulings of his Honor upon the questions as stated above.
The three issues, of defendant's negligence, plaintiff's contributory negligence, and damages, were submitted to the jury and answered in plaintiff's favor, and damages to the amount of $3,000 fixed. From the judgment rendered on the verdict defendant appealed.
After stating the case: The conclusion reached by us, after a most careful consideration of this case, is that the motion of the defendant to nonsuit the plaintiff, at the close of the evidence, ought to have been allowed, and in refusing it his Honor was in error. The principle controlling the decision of this case, and the doctrine generally accepted by the American and English courts, is stated with great clearness and precision by Bigelow, C. J., in Sweeney v. R. R., 10 Allen, 368; 87 Am. Dec., 644, as follows: "There can be no fault or negligence or breach of duty where there is no act or service or contract which a party is bound to perform or fulfill. All the cases in the books in which a party is sought to be charged on the ground that he has caused a way or other place to be encumbered or suffered it to be in a dangerous condition, whereby accident or injury have been occasioned to another, turn on the principle that negligence consists in doing or omitting to do an act by which a legal duty or obligation has been violated. Thus a trespasser who comes on the land of another, without right, can not maintain an action if he runs against a barrier or falls into an excavation there situated. The owner of the land is not bound to protect or provide safeguards for wrongdoers. So a licensee who enters on premises by permission only, without any enticement, allurement or inducement being held out to him by the owner or occupant, can not recover damages for injuries caused by obstructions or pitfalls. He goes (376) there at his own risk and enjoys the license, subject to its concomitant perils. No duty is imposed by law on the owner or occupant to keep his premises in a suitable condition for those who come there solely for their own convenience or pleasure, and who are not either *365
expressly invited to enter or induced to come upon them by the purpose for which the premises are appropriated and occupied, or by some preparation or adaptation of the place for the use by customers or passengers, which might naturally and reasonably lead them to suppose that they might properly and safely enter thereon." This doctrine has been approved by this Court in the following cases: Quantz v. R. R.,
Reversed.
Cited: Money v. Hotel Co.,
(378)