{ "id": 2761946, "name": "Lillian De Bello, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Checker Taxi Company, Inc., Defendant-Appellee", "name_abbreviation": "De Bello v. Checker Taxi Co.", "decision_date": "1972-10-20", "docket_number": "No. 54770", "first_page": "401", "last_page": "406", "citations": [ { "type": "official", "cite": "8 Ill. App. 3d 401" } ], "court": { "name_abbreviation": "Ill. App. Ct.", "id": 8837, "name": "Illinois Appellate Court" }, "jurisdiction": { "id": 29, "name_long": "Illinois", "name": "Ill." }, "cites_to": [ { "cite": "180 N.E.2d 873", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "pin_cites": [ { "page": "881-886" } ], "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "34 Ill.App.2d 421", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 5237036 ], "pin_cites": [ { "page": "440-450" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/34/0421-01" ] }, { "cite": "53 Ill.2d 27", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. 2d", "case_ids": [ 2926853 ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-2d/53/0027-01" ] }, { "cite": "50 N.E.2d 497", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "pin_cites": [ { "page": "504" } ], "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "383 Ill. 366", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill.", "case_ids": [ 2487613 ], "pin_cites": [ { "page": "382" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill/383/0366-01" ] }, { "cite": "10 N.E.2d 714", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "pin_cites": [ { "page": "718" } ], "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "292 Ill.App. 104", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App.", "case_ids": [ 3312183 ], "pin_cites": [ { "page": "113" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app/292/0104-01" ] }, { "cite": "220 N.E.2d 513", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "pin_cites": [ { "page": "517" } ], "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "75 Ill.App.2d 109", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 2577968, 2578619 ], "pin_cites": [ { "page": "118" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/75/0109-02", "/ill-app-2d/75/0109-01" ] }, { "cite": "246 N.E.2d 150", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "pin_cites": [ { "page": "156" } ], "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "106 Ill.App.2d 383", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 1598154 ], "pin_cites": [ { "page": "392-393" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/106/0383-01" ] }, { "cite": "251 N.E.2d 792", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "pin_cites": [ { "page": "793" } ], "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "113 Ill.App.2d 90", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 1589939 ], "pin_cites": [ { "page": "92-93" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/113/0090-01" ] } ], "analysis": { "cardinality": 626, "char_count": 10923, "ocr_confidence": 0.748, "pagerank": { "raw": 2.281343678588974e-07, "percentile": 0.7852054308957781 }, "sha256": "1568e9abf522f9811f88e5efc6d885583376d35e19e30aeb1bb2b186ec26e56e", "simhash": "1:efa7160d122ddfac", "word_count": 1888 }, "last_updated": "2023-07-14T14:39:49.359959+00:00", "provenance": { "date_added": "2019-08-29", "source": "Harvard", "batch": "2018" }, "casebody": { "judges": [], "parties": [ "Lillian De Bello, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Checker Taxi Company, Inc., Defendant-Appellee." ], "opinions": [ { "text": "Mr. JUSTICE ENGLISH\ndelivered the opinion of the court:\nThis personal injury action was brought against defendant-carrier to recover for injuries sustained when plaintff fell out of defendant\u2019s taxi. The trial court, hearing the case without a jury, granted defendant\u2019s motion for a finding at the close of plaintiffs evidence, and entered judgment in favor of defendant.\nPlaintiffs testimony, the only evidence at the trial, brought out the following facts: On January 6, 1963, at about 11:45 A.M., plaintiff was a passenger in defendant\u2019s taxi, traveling from her home to the restaurant where she worked. Upon arriving at the restaurant, the cab driver stopped about a foot away from the curb. After plaintiff paid the fare, tire taxi driver leaned over and opened the back door opposite his seat and on the curb side. Plaintiff was wearing nylon stockings and open-toe shoes, and when she moved her right foot so as to leave the cab through the door which had been opened by the driver, her stocking got caught on a screw which protruded about an inch above the metal strip of molding which ran along the cab\u2019s door sill. The molding itself was \u201ccrumbled\u201d or \u201ccurled up at the edge.\u201d Plaintiff, who weighed 200 pounds, did not see the protruding screw or crumbled metal strip before she started to step out of the cab, she having entered the cab through the door on the driver\u2019s side. She tried to push her right foot loose with her left foot, but the nylon stocking had twisted around the screw, and her foot was stuck. She was partly out of the door with her right foot still stuck on the screw when she saw a manhole in the street below, between her and the curb. She got dizzy and called out the name of the restaurant\u2019s chef who was standing on the sidewalk. She then lost her balance and fell out of the cab. The chef ran over and caught her, but not before her knees hit the concrete. The cab driver remained seated in the cab on the driver\u2019s side.\nPlaintiff could not remember whether it was raining or snowing, but the street was wet because her stockings and legs were \u201cslushy.\u201d\nTwo men from the restaurant earned plaintiff into the building, and a waitress removed plaintiff\u2019s stockings. Plaintiff asked someone to call her doctor at his home. He came to the scene but immediately took plaintiff to his office for X-rays, and then put elastic tape on both of plaintiff\u2019s legs. Both knees were scratched and bruised, and both legs \u201cwent up like balloons\u201d from the thighs down.\nPlaintiff was treated with pain killers and penicillin for an infection which flared up in one of her knees, and after about four or five months, her legs \u201cwent down.\u201d She is still unable to walk the way she did before the accident because she has an ache in her right hipbone. Since the time of the accident, she has seen three or four different doctors for various treatments in relation to this difficulty.\nOn cross-examination, it was brought out that about ten years before the accident, plaintiff had a \u201ctightness\u201d in her ankles and a numbness in her right knee which made it hard for her to stand after having been kneeling.\nWhen plaintiff had rested her case, defendant moved the court for a finding in its favor on the ground that plaintiff\u2019s evidence had not established a prima facie case. The court granted the motion and entered judgment in defendant\u2019s favor.\nIll. Rev. Stat. 1969, ch. 110, par. 64(5) provides:\n\u201cIn all cases tried without a jury, defendant may, at the close of plaintiffs case, move for a finding, judgment or decree in his favor. In ruling on the motion the court shall weigh the evidence. If the ruling on the motion is favorable to the defendant, a judgment or decree dismissing the action shall be entered. If the ruling on the motion is adverse to the defendant he may proceed to adduce evidence in support of his defense, in which event the motion is waived. * * (Emphasis added.)\nBy use of the phrase, \u201cweigh the evidence,\u201d in this context, the Civil Practice Act requires the trial judge, at the close of plaintiff\u2019s case, to evaluate the evidence by determining the credibility of the witnesses, reasonable inferences to be drawn from their testimony, and, in general, the weight and quality of the testimony, in order to conclude whether or not the evidence to that point of the trial has made out a prima facie case in favor of plaintiff. (Allfree v. Estate of Rosenthal, 113 Ill.App.2d 90, 92-93, 251 N.E.2d 792, 793; Miller v. Heller, 106 Ill.App.2d 383, 392-393, 246 N.E.2d 150, 156.) On appeal, the reviewing court must itself examine the evidence and determine whether or not the trial court erred in deciding the case contrary to the manifest weight of the evidence. See Bilyeu v. Plant, 75 Ill.App.2d 109, 118, 220 N.E.2d 513, 517.\nDefendant contends that the finding in its favor was properly entered because the trial court correctly decided that plaintiff had not sustained her burden of proof as to liability. Conceding that a carrier owes to its passengers the exercise of the highest degree of care compatible with the practical operation of its business, it argues that here plaintiffs testimony proved only that an unfortunate accident had occurred \u2014 an accident for which defendant was not responsible. Defendant bases this argument on one statement which plaintiff made while being cross-examined at trial. In response to defense attorney\u2019s question as to what happened after her stocking got stuck on the screw, plaintiff stated, \u201cNaturally I could see that manhole in front of me. I did get dizzy and * * * I went down * * * both knees down to the concrete # # # \u201d Defendant now contends that plaintiff, by this testimony, disproved her own allegation that the entanglement of her stocldng on a protruding screw caused her to trip and faU as she was getting out of the cab. On the contrary, defendant argues, plaintiff\u2019s testimony showed that it was her dizziness which caused her to fall from the cab.\nWe can find no distinction between the two causes as defendant sees it. The fact that the 200-pound plaintiff might become dizzy upon seeing the uneven surface of a manhole directly in front of her as the only place she might step, is not inconsistent with her allegation that it was the protruding screw which caused her to fall. Whether plaintiff fell because her stocking was enmeshed on the screw, resulting in her being off-balance with one foot pinned under her, or whether she fell because, while trying to extricate her stocking from the screw, she became dizzy upon seeing a manhole in front of her, makes no difference. In either case, she was stuck on the screw before and as she fell, thus clearly establishing that fact as a proximate cause of her fall. Nor should it be of any assistance to defendant to argue that it is relieved of liability because plaintiff became dizzy upon seeing a manhole as her only place of exit from the cab; and this in view of the general rule that a carrier must furnish a safe place for a passenger to alight from its vehicle. Thomason v. Chicago Motor Coach Co., 292 Ill.App. 104, 113, 10 N.E.2d 714, 718.\nIn our opinion, the evidence presented by plaintiff did tend to establish all the necessary elements of a prima facie case: the presence of a passenger-carrier relationship, with defendant owing to plaintiff the highest degree of care consistent with the practical operation of its business, the breach of that duty by defendant when it allowed a screw to protrude above the metal molding strip on the door sill and the metal to become \u201ccrumbled\u201d or \u201ccurled up,\u201d the catching of plaintiffs stocking on the screw, causing her to fall to the pavement, and the resulting injury to plaintiff while she was in the exercise of ordinary care for her own safety. The evidence also shows, we believe, that the condition of the screw and the molding strip was such as could not have occurred except by some sort of accident of which defendant would have had current notice, or over a sufficient period of time to have constituted constructive notice to defendant. (See Neering v. I.C.R.R. Co., 383 Ill. 366, 382, 50 N.E.2d 497, 504.) Further, on this point, as argued by defendant \u2014that plaintiff had failed to prove how or how long the screw and the molding strip happened to be in a condition dangerous to passengers\u2014 it appears to us that the question of defendant\u2019s knowledge, constructive or otherwise, is answered in rather classic form at this stage of the trial by application of the res ipsa doctrine.\nThis conclusion is bolstered by the recent Illinois Supreme Court case of Katamay v. Chicago Transit Authority (1972), 53 Ill.2d 27, which affirmed a judgment for the plaintiff. While the principal issue there was whether or not plaintiff was to be considered a passenger, (a matter over which there is no dispute in the instant case), and the court held that she was a passenger, the opinion went on to say that \u201c[t]he passenger to whom the carrier owes the duty to exercise the highest degree of care is one who is in the act of boarding, is upon, or is in the act of alighting from, the carriers vehicle\u201d. (Emphasis supplied). And further, \u201cIf, at the time she fell, she was in the act of boarding, defendant owed her the duty to exercise a degree of care for her safety equal to the duty owed to provide her a safe place to alight.\u201d\nWhile the court in Katamay did not mention res ipsa, we believe the decision must be relevant to that doctrine on this issue as the case had gone to the jury without any proof of a defect in the platform, and without any proof that defendant had knowledge, actual or constructive, that the platform was in an unsafe condition. We consider Katamay to represent an \u201ca fortiori\u201d situation in relation to the instant case.\nWe hold, therefore, that the judgment is against the manifest weight of the evidence, and that the order of the trial judge dismissing plaintiff\u2019s cause of action was erroneous.\nPursuant to Section 64(5) of the Civil Practice Act, supra, the judgment is therefore reversed and the cause is remanded with directions to proceed as though defendant\u2019s motion had been denied or waived.\nReversed and remanded with directions.\nLORENZ, P. J., and DRUCKER, J., concur.\nFor a discussion of the trial court\u2019s obligation in weighing the evidence, see Brubaker v. Gould, 34 Ill.App.2d 421, 440-450, 180 N.E.2d 873, 881-886.\nShe was standing on an elevated platform, and when the train came in she started toward it but fell, and was injured, as the flanged heels of her shoes had become wedged between the planks of the platform (she, too, weighed 200 pounds).", "type": "majority", "author": "Mr. JUSTICE ENGLISH" } ], "attorneys": [ "Goldberg & Fain, of Chicago, for appellant.", "Jesmer and Harris, of Chicago, (Julius Jesmer and Robert D. Jesmer, of counsel,) for appellee." ], "corrections": "", "head_matter": "Lillian De Bello, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Checker Taxi Company, Inc., Defendant-Appellee.\n(No. 54770;\nFirst District \u2014\nOctober 20, 1972.\nRehearing denied December 8, 1972.\nGoldberg & Fain, of Chicago, for appellant.\nJesmer and Harris, of Chicago, (Julius Jesmer and Robert D. Jesmer, of counsel,) for appellee." }, "file_name": "0401-01", "first_page_order": 423, "last_page_order": 428 }