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GILES v. NEW HAVEN2/8/1994
The defendant Otis Elevator Company (defendant) appeals from the Appellate Court's determination that the trial court should not have granted
the defendant's motion for a directed verdict in an action by the plaintiff, an elevator operator, to recover for the defendant's negligent failure to inspect, maintain and repair an elevator compensation chain that caused the plaintiff to sustain personal injuries. The Appellate Court concluded that the plaintiff had presented sufficient evidence to warrant presentation of the question of negligence under the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur to the jury. We affirm the judgment of the Appellate Court.
As a preliminary matter, we note that this appeal is before us pursuant to the granting of a directed verdict. "`Directed verdicts are not favored and should be granted only when the jury could not reasonably and legally reach any other conclusion. . . .'" Puro v. Henry, 188 Conn. 301, 303, 449 A.2d 176 (1982). Thus, in the context of a res ipsa loquitur case, " f the defendant seeks a directed verdict in his [or her] favor, he [or she] must produce evidence which will destroy any reasonable inference of negligence, or so completely contradict it that reasonable persons could no longer accept it. The evidence necessary to do this will vary with the strength of the inference. It takes more of an explanation to justify a falling elephant than a falling brick, more to account for a hundred defective bottles than for one. If the defendant shows definitely that the occurrence was caused by some outside agency over which the defendant had no control, that it was of a kind which commonly occurs without negligence on the part of anyone, or that it could not have been avoided by the exercise of all reasonable care, the inference of negligence is no longer permissible, and the verdict
is directed for the defendant." W. Prosser & W. Keeton, Torts (5th Ed. 1984) 40, p. 261.
The court may withdraw a case from the jury only when there is no question as to the existence of the facts necessary to invoke the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur. "Phrased differently, the question of negligence is one of law for the court only when the facts are not in any event or in any view of the case susceptible to the inference of negligence sought to be deduced therefrom . . . ." (Emphasis added.) 57B Am. Jur.2d 598, Negligence 1931 (1989). Accordingly, in reviewing the trial court's decision to direct a verdict in favor of a defendant, we must consider the evidence in the light most favorable to the plaintiff and then must determine whether the jury could reasonably and legally have reached a conclusion other than one in the moving party's favor. Petyan v. Ellis, 200 Conn. 243, 244, 510 A.2d 1337 (1986); Pinto v. Spigner, 163 Conn. 191, 193, 302 A.2d 266 (1972).
Applying these principles, the Appellate Court reviewed the record and concluded that the trial court could reasonably have considered the following facts in deciding whether the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur applied. "For fourteen years, the plaintiff was an elevator operator for one of the three elevators in the Powell Building in New Haven. On the date her injuries were sustained, the elevator she was operating was ascending from the first floor to the twelfth floor when its compensation chain became hooked on a rail bracket located on the wall of the elevator shaft. The plaintiff was not able to control the movement of the chain from the interior of the cab. Once hooked, the chain then tightened up and broke free from two bolts securing it to the underside of the cab. The cab began to shudder and shake, and the plaintiff struck her head and shoulder against the walls of the cab.
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