Cumins v. Wood

Mr. Justice Lawrence delivered the opinion of the Court: The only question of law in this record is, as to where lies the burden of proof as to the fact of negligence in an action brought by a bailor against a bailee, in whose hands the goods have suffered injury. The counsel for appellants, while admitting the authorities to be in conflict, insist that the weight of authority would throw the burden on the bailor. We held the opposite rule to be the more reasonable one in the ease of Bennett v. O'Brien, 37 Ill. 250, and we are not inclined to depart from that decision. That, it is true, was a case of gratuitous bailment, but the reason of the rule applies as well to a bailment for hire. That was a case of a borrowed horse injured while in the possession of the borrower. The present suit is brought by a person who had stored furniture with the defendants at such rates of storage as the defendants asked, and which rates were paid by the plaintiff, and when the latter demanded his goods, a part of them were restored to him in a damaged condition, and the carpets were not returned at all. How, in cases of this sort, it would be very difficult for the plaintiff to show in what way the injury and loss had occurred, or that they had occurred by the actual negligence of the defendants, or their employees. The plaintiff would not know what persons had been engaged in the defendants’ warehouse, nor where to find the testimony necessary to support his action. On the other hand, the defendants would know, or ought to know, what persons had "had access to the goods, and could easily show that proper care had been exercised in regard to them, if such was the fact. For this reason we hold it the more reasonable rule, when the bailor has shown he stored the goods in good condition, and they were returned to him in a damaged state, or not returned at all, that the law should presume negligence on the part of the bailee, and impose on him the burden of showing he has exercised such care as was required by the nature of the bailment. In the present case, perhaps the presumption of negligence was sufficiently rebutted by the evidence in regard to the fire as to all the goods except the carpets. But no explanation is made in regard to these. The defendants themselves prove that the firemen took away none of the goods, and that they were in the fourth story, where no person but the employees of the defendants had access to them. The fire only burnt a hole in the floor, and no attempt is made to prove that the carpets were destroyed by the fire. The presumption from the proof is, if the carpets were not taken away by an employee of the defendants, that they were taken by some person to whom the defendants improperly permitted access to the place where the goods were kept. The verdict did not exceed the value of the carpets, and we see no reason for reversing the judgment. Judgment affirmed.