Brunell

This is an action for damages for personal injuries received by Fred W. Brunell, a minor aged 20 years, by an electric discharge from a power wire owned and operated by the Mountain States Power Company and accidentally touched by the minor. The lower court instructed the jury to return a verdict for the defendant. The alleged n~gligence solely relied upon on this appeal is the failure of the company to use automatic circuit breakers in lieu of fuses on the power line in question. The defendant denied that this was negligence, denied that such failure wa~ a proximate cause of the accident, and claims that the evidence establishes negligence of the minor as a matter of law.

The power line in question extended from the power house of the appellee in North Bend, Or., to the Hauser Construction Quarries. About 4:30 p. m. Sunday, August 6, 1933, a Ford automobile, occupied by two boys, crashed into the pole supporting the appellee's power line and broke the pole so that the pole and its power lines sagged over the highway. Two of the wires came in contact, causing a short circuit which burned out the fuses on these two wires between the pole and the generating plant. The third wire…