Crawford v. City of Des Moines
| Decision Date | 12 November 1963 |
| Docket Number | No. 51103,51103 |
| Citation | 124 N.W.2d 868,255 Iowa 861 |
| Parties | William CRAWFORD and Arkansas Crawford, Appellants, v. CITY OF DES MOINES, Iowa, Appellee. |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
W. Lawrence Oliver, Des Moines, for appellants.
Leonard C. Abels, Corp. Counsel, and Don Hise, Asst. City Atty., Des Moines, for appellee.
This case comes to us upon the pleadings. Plaintiffs' amended and substituted petition alleged that they had been the owners of certain real estate in Des Moines abutting on Third Street; that in May, 1961, the city passed its resolution, copy of which is attached, authorizing the Iowa State Highway Commission to improve Third Street by the construction of a freeway and relocating Second Street, and that in August, September and October of that year Third Street was so altered by relocation of Second Street in accordance with said resolution as to entirely cut off access to Third Street from the South and to substantially interfere with the light, air and view which plaintiffs' dwelling had enjoyed; and that they had no other access to the street. The petition further alleged that in December, 1961, the defendant condemned plaintiffs' property, but the condemnation award was based on the depreciated value of the real estate, which was $5,000.00 less than it would have been before the rights of access, air, light and view were cut off. Mandamus to compel condemnation of these rights was asked. The record shows that plaintiffs' action was first filed against the Iowa State Highway Commission, but that the court, upon an application for adjudication of law points, under R.C.P. 105, 58 I.C.A., ruled against them, holding that the commission 'is not liable for the damages sued for by the plaintiffs', and further that 'all the issues raised by the plaintiffs in this action were proper issues to be considered in said condemnation proceedings (presumably the proceeding of December, 1961) and must be considered as having been adjudicated therein.' The plaintiffs took no appeal from this ruling, but then filed their present amended and substituted petition making the City of Des Moines the sole defendant. The city was not a defendant in the original petition and was not a party when the ruling adjudicating law points was made.
To the amended and substituted petition the city filed its motion to dismiss, on four grounds: 1, that the court had no jurisdiction of the case because the ruling on request for adjudication of law points was a final judgment and since no appeal was taken it became the law of the case; 2 and 3, the plaintiffs do not allege they are the present owners of the property which they seek to have the defendant condemn, but affirmatively allege they are not the present owners; and 4, that they fail to state a cause of action for the reason they affirmatively allege the defendant did condemn their property. The trial court granted the motion to dismiss, without ruling on each ground separately; but apparently its ruling was based on the thought that the defendant was the present owner of the property. It is of course true that if any ground of the motion was good, the ruling must be upheld. State v. Eichler, 248 Iowa 1267, 1274, 1275, 83 N.W.2d 576, 580. So we must consider all grounds to determine whether the ruling was correct. Judgment was entered upon the ruling, the petition dismissed, and we have this appeal.
I. The first ground of the motion was based upon the ruling made in the case against the highway commission which, in addition to holding the commission was no liable for the damages asked, said that the issues raised in that petition were proper to be asserted in the condemnation proceedings of the City of Des Moines in December, 1961 and 'must be considered as having been adjudicated therein.' At the time of the first ruling the highway commission was the sole defendant. It was only after this ruling that the plaintiffs filed their substituted petition against the present defendant. The city concedes that if the plaintiffs had commenced an entirely new action against the city they would have no basis for their claim of res judicata; but that, since they did not do this, but filed a substituted petition in the same action, they are bound by the ruling. We think this is an unsound distinction. The present case is no more or less than a new action. An original notice was served upon the city; a new petition, which made it the sole defendant and in no way involved the original defendant, or so much as named it, was filed. We could pass over the defendant's contention at this point because the record does not show what the issues were in the defunct case against the highway commission; it is only from the arguments that we gather the plaintiffs were there attempting to secure the same relief they now ask against the city. But we think the general rules of res judicata also apply. An adjudication is only a bar to further litigation if made in an action between the same parties and involving the same subject. Not only is there a failure to show that same subject was involved, but the city was not a party in the former case. There was no identity of parties, and so on proper claim of res judicata can be made in the instant action. Hoover v. Iowa State Highway Commission, 210 Iowa 1, 8, 230 N.W. 561, 564.
The court properly held, in the first case, that no action would lie against the highway commission, because the city, having authorized the change in grade and other improvements involved in the building of the freeway, became liable for the damages caused. Liddick v. City of Council Bluffs, 232 Iowa 197, 5 N.W.2d 361; sections 389.22-389.25 inclusive, Code of 1958, I.C.A. In holding, if it did so hold, that the issues in the abortive case against the highway commission were also to be decided against the plaintiffs because the property had been condemned by the city and all questions of damage arising from the construction of the freeway should have been decided there, or were necessarily abandoned, the court went beyond what was needed and, in fact, what was right. In any event, since we do not know the exact issues litigated there, and because the parties were clearly not the same, we find no prior adjudication of the issues in the present case or anything which estops plaintiffs from asserting their present claim
II. Grounds two and three of the motion to dismiss involve the same point: the record shows the plaintiffs are not the owners of the property which they seek to compel the defendant to condemn. It is...
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