Opinion
January 24, 1933.
March 20, 1933.
Negligence — Contributory — Pedestrian — Failure to look before entering on street car track.
A pedestrian who looks for approaching cars before stepping from the sidewalk, but then passes in front of a standing vehicle and does not further look before entering on the street car track in the middle of a 30-foot cartway, is negligent as a matter of law.
Before FRAZER, C. J., KEPHART, SCHAFFER, MAXEY, DREW and LINN, JJ.
Appeals, Nos. 181 and 182, Jan. T., 1933, by plaintiffs, from judgments of C. P. Lackawanna Co., Jan. T., 1932, No. 1368, refusing to take off nonsuit, in case of Margley Letts and Harry Letts v. Bonita Capwell Cole, Catherine A. Capwell and Stephen W. Capwell. Affirmed.
Trespass for personal injuries. Before LEACH, J.
The opinion of the Supreme Court states the facts.
Nonsuit entered. Refusal to take it off. Plaintiffs appealed.
Error assigned was refusal of court to take off nonsuit, quoting record.
Jacob Klensin, for appellants. Walter W. Harris, of O'Malley, Hill, Harris Harris, for appellee, was not heard.
Argued January 24, 1933.
Plaintiffs, husband and wife, sued to recover compensation for injuries received by the latter when struck by defendant's automobile. The accident happened shortly after the noon hour November 2, 1931. Mrs. Letts, alighted from a northbound bus in which she was a passenger, at the corner of Washington Avenue at its intersection with Franklin Street, in the Borough of Jermyn, passed in front of the standing bus to cross to the opposite side of the street, and was hit while crossing the car track, located in the middle of the 30-foot cartway, by defendant's car traveling in the same direction as the bus from which she alighted. Mrs. Letts testified she looked toward the south, the direction from which defendant's automobile came, before stepping from the sidewalk after leaving the bus, saw no traffic approaching, and did not again look in that direction before entering on the street car track upon which defendant's automobile was running, and had almost cleared the track when struck by defendant's car. At the conclusion of plaintiff's testimony, the trial judge entered a compulsory nonsuit on the ground that the evidence showed Mrs. Letts guilty, as a matter of law, of contributory negligence in failing to look for approaching vehicles, after passing in front of the bus and before committing herself to the street car track. The judgment entered by the court below was properly sustained by the court in banc, under Patton v. George, 284 Pa. 342; McAteer v. Highland Coffee Co., 291 Pa. 32; Halpert v. Ernshaw, 304 Pa. 95.
The judgment is affirmed.