Riopel v. City of Worcester

• Decision Date: 15 October 1912
• Citation: 99 N.E. 478,213 Mass. 15
• Parties: RIOPEL v. CITY OF WORCESTER.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

213 Mass. 15

99 N.E. 478

RIOPEL v. CITY OF WORCESTER.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Worcester.

October 15, 1912

Oct 15, 1912.

COUNSEL

John H. Meagher and Emil Zaeder, both of Worcester, for plaintiff.

E. H Vaughan and C. S. Anderson, both of Worcester, for defendant.

OPINION

DE COURCY, J.

The plaintiff was regularly appointed a reserve member of the police department of Worcester on December 1, 1905, and served under that appointment until he left the police service February 4, 1911. He received his pay weekly and receipted upon the regular pay roll sheet for reserve policemen. During most of the time between December 1, 1906 and October 29, 1908, he was paid 25 cents a day less than were the regular patrolmen, whose pay was fixed by an order of the city council dated December 14, 1896; and he now seeks to recover this difference, amounting in all to $166.25. To support his claim he contends that the city had no authority to establish a reserve police force, and that he is therefore entitled to the rate of pay fixed by the order of December 14, 1896.

The city council never accepted St. 1896, c. 314 (now R. L. c. 108, §§ 26-28), providing for the appointment of a reserve police force in cities. Presumably under the city charter, St. 1893, c. 444, § 41, which authorized the city council to establish a police department and to determine its membership, an ordinance was approved March 15, 1902, which established as a part of the police department a reserve police force, and provided that its members should receive 'such compensation for time actually spent in such service as the mayor may fix.'

We do not deem it necessary to consider the validity of this ordinance under which the plaintiff was appointed and served nor the sufficiency of the mayor's action in fixing his compensation, as the plaintiff's salary has been paid and accepted under the same and as full payment for his services. Libbey v. Lawrence, 128 Mass. 215. He cannot avail himself of the order of December 14, 1896, because obviously that applies only to the day of the regular patrolmen, and in fact was passed more than five years before a reserve police force was created. And as he never was appointed or served as a regular patrolman he would not be entitled to compensation as such even if the ordinance of March 5, 1902, were invalid. An invalid appointment to one office would not operate as a valid appointment...