Cockerham v. Barnes

This is a personal injury suit in which the appellee recovered $26,750 as compensatory damages for the loss of his left leg. The appellant contends that he was entitled to a directed verdict and, alternatively, that the court erred in refusing certain requested instructions.

Until the accident in question the plaintiff Barnes, a young man of twenty-three, had worked as a farm laborer on Coekerham’s farm ever since he was old enough to work. In July of 1955 Cockerham had his employees install a hydraulic irrigation system upon a forty-acre tract. The system consists of a main pipeline that lies…