Negligence, Employer's liability, Of one controlling real estate, Matter of conjecture, Injury from slipping on object whose presence is unexplained.
Where a scrubwoman employed in a hotel was injured by falling when descending a properly lighted flight of stairs in the hotel building by reason of stepping on some "sort of slippery refuse . . . like grease," her employer is not liable for her injury, if there is nothing to show how or when the object on which the woman slipped came upon the stairs.
Collection of cases of personal injuries from falls caused by slipping on objects whose presence was unexplained.
By THE COURT.
The plaintiff, while rightfully descending stairs upon the premises of the defendant, her employer, "felt that there was something under her foot slippery" and fell. Later she noticed that upon her clothes there was some "sort of slippery refuse . . . like grease." There was an overhead electric bulb light toward the lower end of the stairs. There is nothing to indicate negligence on the part of the defendant. For aught that appears the object upon which the plaintiff slipped may have been dropped there but a moment before by some one for whose conduct in this respect the defendant was not responsible. The case is governed by Goddard v. Boston Maine Railroad, 179 Mass. 52, Lyons v. Boston Elevated Railway, 204 Mass. 227, Hotenbrink v. Boston Elevated Railway, 211 Mass. 77, Norton v. Hudner, 213 Mass. 257, and similar cases.
Exceptions overruled.