Carpena

Plaintiff appeals from an adverse judgment in an action for personal injury. The ease was tried by the court without jury. It was stipulated that the issue of liability should be tried and determined before evidence would be offered on the issue of damages. The court found that defendant was not negligent and that plaintiff was negligent and that such negligence was a proximate cause of his injuries.

At the time of the accident plaintiff was a prisoner riding in a Los Angeles County sheriff’s department jail bus. On Sunday, February 23, 1958, plaintiff had been arrested, and on Monday, the 24th, he pleaded guilty to drunk driving and on Tuesday, the 25th, was placed in the jail bus for transportation from the city of Monrovia to the county jail in the city of Los Angeles. His hands were placed in hand cuffs with his hands in front of his body, in conformity with the sheriff’s rule that prisoners in transit be handcuffed. The aisle was to the right of plaintiff.

Plaintiff was sleeping or almost asleep with his hands on the back of the seat in front of him and his head on his hands when the bus gave a jolt or jerk and plaintiff fell from his seat onto the floor of the bus,…