Appeal of Cassidy
| Decision Date | 21 June 1935 |
| Citation | 179 A. 425 |
| Parties | Appeal of CASSIDY et al. |
| Court | Maine Supreme Court |
On Motion from Superior Court, Penobscot County.
Proceedings by the City of Bangor to condemn land and buildings thereon for public use. From an estimate of damages by the County Commissioners of Penobscot County, James W. Cassidy and another, as trustees under the will of John Cassidy, deceased, appealed to the superior court, in which a jury returned a verdict for appellants in the same amount, and they move for a new trial.
Motion denied.
Argued before PATTANGALL, C. J., and STURGIS, BARNES, THAXTER, and HUDSON, JJ.
Edgar M. Simpson, of Bangor, for appellants.
William S. Cole, of Bangor, for city of Bangor.
By regular statutory proceedings the city of Bangor took a parcel of land, with buildings thereon, for public use in changing the alignment of a public way, in said city, under the authority of Rev. St. c. 27, § 76, and, after hearing, the county commissioners of Penobscot county, on petition of the municipal officers, determined the damages in the sum of $33,976.68, ordering the city to pay that sum to the appellants.
The latter, considering themselves aggrieved by the estimate of damages of the county commissioners, took an appeal to the superior court, which resulted in a verdict for appellants in the same amount as determined by the county commissioners, and the case is argued here on a motion for new trial in the usual form, and "because the damages are entirely inadequate and insufficient."
The land taken is a corner lot in the wholesale section of the city of Bangor at the end of the concrete bridge across Kenduskeag stream, on the westerly side of Broad street, bounded southerly by Independent street, westerly by Haymarket Square, and terminates in a party wall on the northerly side.
The area of the lot is 8,889 square feet, or a little more, and for structures contained a warehouse building, a two and one-half story building, used as a restaurant and a metal workers' shop, a blacksmith's shop, and a party wall of brick between this lot and the lot adjoining on the north.
Pickering Square is at such elevation above Broad street that the entrance to buildings on this lot at the margin of the square would be on the second floor of such buildings continued to Broad street.
Such was the construction of the warehouse building, enhancing its value, as claimed, for use in receiving, storing, and discharging heavy merchandise.
The city contends that the finding of the jury furnishes the just compensation to be found as damages for such taking of private property; the appellants that the damages found by the jury are so inadequate as to justify the awarding of a new trial, and particularly because the sum found by the jury is exactly equal to that previously estimated by the county commissioners.
Thus we are confronted with a question of jurisdiction, whether or not the appellants are entitled to a hearing on their motion for a new trial.
The statute already cited, which authorizes the taking of land to secure a change of alignment of a highway and which directs the procedure, provides that parties aggrieved by the estimate of damages of the county commissioners "shall have like remedy as provided by statute for appraisal of damages for land taken by towns for highway purposes."
Appeal properly lays the case before the superior court, and one method of trial there is by jury.
Error may creep into a case in a trial court, and, as broadly stated in somewhat analogous proceedings in Carvill v. Carvill, 73 Me. 136, 139, "Whenever a jury trial is had, there may be a motion or exceptions for the correction of errors, whether of the court or jury."
This practice has been followed in Lennox, Petitioner, v. Knox & Lincoln R. Co., 62 Me. 322; Wilson v. City of South Portland, 106 Me. 146, 76 A. 284; Chase v. City of Portland, 86 Me. 367, 29 A. 1104; Sherburne v. Inhabitants of Sanford, 113 Me. 66, 92 A. 997; Simoneau v. Inhabitants of Livermore Falls, 131 Me. 165, 159 A. 853.
Appellants from estimate of damages will be heard when the estimate is attacked as excessive or...
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