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Langenhorst v. Norfolk Southern Railway Co.12/15/2004
UNPUBLISHED
The two Norfolk Southern Railway Company crossbucks that bracket railroad crossing 724641H, and warn of its existence, cast their shadows 26 miles east by northeast of the St. Clair County courthouse. The crossbucks stand about nine miles closer to the Clinton County courthouse.
This seemingly unimportant geographical difference in reference to the courtrooms of two adjacent counties became important when Rita Langenhorst chose to file this wrongful death action in St. Clair County, instead of Clinton County. Widow Langenhorst lives in Clinton County, only 500 feet from the Clinton County crossing that claimed her husband's life.
Because the accident that led to Gerald Langenhorst's death occurred in Clinton County, because Rita Langenhorst lives in Clinton County, and because a number of potential witnesses hail from Clinton County, Norfolk Southern Railway Company (Norfolk Southern) and several of its employees claim that a defense of this action in a St. Clair County courtroom will inconvenience them. They prefer to litigate in a Clinton County courtroom, maintaining that a trial in Clinton County will better serve the ends of justice than a trial in the forum that widow Langenhorst prefers.
When the railroad and its employees asked St. Clair County Circuit Judge Lloyd Cueto to transfer the case, he refused to do so. Judge Cueto concluded that the reasons behind the defendants' plea for a more convenient courtroom did not strongly favor their desired transfer to Clinton County.
Norfolk Southern and its employees petitioned us to allow an immediate interlocutory appeal of the ruling pursuant to Supreme Court Rule 306 (166 Ill. 2d R. 306). We denied the petition. The defendants then petitioned the Illinois Supreme Court for its review of the ruling. Our high court denied the defendants' request for leave to appeal but used its supervisory power to order our reconsideration of the matter in light of two recent supreme court decisions-Dawdy v. Union Pacific R.R. Co., 207 Ill. 2d 167, 797 N.E.2d 687 (2003), and First American Bank v. Guerine, 198 Ill. 2d 511, 764 N.E.2d 54 (2002). Langenhorst v. Norfolk Southern Ry. Co., 205 Ill. 2d 586, 796 N.E.2d 1053 (2003). This interlocutory appeal ensued.
We must determine whether Judge Cueto abused the exercise of his discretion when he refused to allow the defendants' request for a transfer to Clinton County. We only find such an abuse if we conclude that "no reasonable person would take the view adopted by [Judge Cueto]." Dawdy, 207 Ill. 2d at 177, 797 N.E.2d at 696.
Regardless of where it will be told, this lawsuit's story will speak to human tragedy. The accident that led to Gerald Langenhorst's death took place on the Langenhorst farm. The farm is located several miles west of Germantown, Illinois , on the southwestern edge of Clinton County. It rests only a few miles east of St. Clair County's eastern border. For that reason, the farm is just about as close to Belleville, Illinois, as it is to Carlyle, Illinois, the county seats of St. Clair and Clinton Counties.
Belleville and Germantown are sister cities, with a common heritage. German immigrants settled in this region of southern Illinois during the nineteenth century.
The Langenhorst family has drawn sustenance from the farm, and renewed itself there, for generations. Anthony and Ann, offspring of Rita and Gerald's union, grew up there, just like Gerald before them. And all the while, a set of Norfolk Southern railroad tracks ran right through the middle of the farm. The rails were laid long ago. Iron horses, pulling freight-laden carriages, have thundered through the Langenhorst cornf
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