Noble v. Louisville Taxicab & Transfer Co.

255 S.W.2d 493 (1952)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Ps arrived at Union Station at about 1:45 a. m and the mother hired D's taxicab to take them to their home. The mother, a young woman, was pregnant at the time and her little daughter, Sherry, was nauseated. Sherry vomited in d's taxicab on their way home. The driver of the cab, Wood, Sr., ordered her to clean up the vomit, and that she went into her dark house to get a rag for that purpose while Wood detained Sherry just outside the cab. Wood was a big man (6 feet 1 1/2 inches, 210 pounds), Sherry was sick, and the mother 'was not feeling very well and the little girl had heard a lot of stories and bad things happening to women; there was a lot in the paper along about that time and about little children. The mother cleaned up the floor of the cab because she was afraid of Wood, who still held Sherry. According to Wood when Sherry got out of the cab 'the little tot started to heave again and she vomited against my leg where I was standing by the side of the door and I reached down and touched this little baby on her shoulder, and I said: 'Why, honey, you are not through vomiting yet, are you?' The mother attempted to clean the cab with kleenex, and that she went into the house to get cash for her fare. The mother construed Wood's holding of Sherry to be a detention of the child. At trial, wood stated that: “I touched her with my little finger to keep her from falling over.” The cab was cleaned, the fare was paid, and Wood went his way. She reentered her home with Sherry and found her husband there asleep. She told him her version of the taxi trip including Wood's allegedly directing her to sniff the moist spot on the cab floor to ascertain whether a suggestive whiff remained. Ps sued Ds for $25,000 damages for false imprisonment of Sherry. P contends that she did not voluntarily remain in the cab to clean it, or voluntarily get down to smell the floor to ascertain if any odor remained, or voluntarily go into her house to procure rags, or voluntarily leave her daughter in the custody of Wood. P testified to no overt act of Wood's which indicated an intention on his part of inflicting any bodily harm upon either her or Sherry. D got the verdict and P appealed.