Rowbotham v. Jones

• Decision Date: 30 October 1890
• Citation: 20 A. 731,47 N.J.E. 337
• Parties: ROWBOTHAM et al. v. JONES.
• Court: New Jersey Court of Chancery

20 A. 731

47 N.J.E. 337

ROWBOTHAM et al.

v. JONES.

Court of Chancery of New Jersey.

Oct. 30, 1890.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

On bill and demurrer.

Edward Dudley and George M. Robeson, for complainants. L. M. Garrison, for defendant.

McGILL, Ch. The bill is filed by two gentlemen who live in separate dwellings, each of which is a few hundred feet from a private insane asylum, which has lately been established, and is maintained by the defendant in three detached buildings. It alleges that each of the buildings, used for asylum purposes, was originally a private dwelling; that the grounds about the buildings are not guarded by suitable fences or walls to prevent the escape of insane patients; that a large number of insane persons, many of whom are violent, are habitually kept in the asylum; that numbers of them are allowed to roam about the asylum lawns, and in the public highways of the neighborhood, either unattended or inefficiently attended; that patients have been suffered to escape from the asylum not only in the day, but also at night, and wander about the neighborhood; that fights between patients and their attendants frequently take place upon the asylum lawns, and in the adjoining public highways, in which "terrible" language is used; that insane patients are permitted to make indecent exposure of their persons on the asylum lawns, at the fences about them, and at the windows of the asylum buildings, and to use offensive and indecent language; that frequently violent female patients scream for hours at a time, both in the day and night, at the top of their voices, so that they can be heard for a distance of a half mile from the asylum, and that these yells are of a most distressing character, as if the patients were in great terror, or in bodily pain; and that insane patients, suffered to become intoxicated, roam about, attempt to enter the houses of the complainants, and thus keep their families in terror. The bill exhibits that all indecent exposures cannot be seen, and that all indecent language cannot be heard, at the same time, at the houses of both the complainants; but that, in habitual occurrence, thereby, at one time one complainant is annoyed at his house, and at another time the other complainant is annoyed at his house, and thus discomfort is produced to both. Also, that while all fences surrounding the asylum buildings are insecure, the fence which separates those buildings from Mr. Rowbotham's house is particularly insecure. The defendant demurs to the bill because he complains that it does not exhibit a common nuisance to both complainants, which affects each of them in a similar manner, but, on the contrary, distinct nuisances to each of the complainants, affecting each of them in a different way, and that therefore the complainants have improperly joined in the action.

Courts of equity have always exercised a sound discretion in determining whether parties are properly joined in a suit. Their object has been to adopt a course which will best promote the due administration of justice without multiplying unnecessary litigation on the one hand, or drawing suitors into needless and oppressive expenses, and confusing the courts with many issues, on the other. In pursuit of this object it may be said that it is the established rule in this state that several owners of distinct tenements may join in a suit to restrain a nuisance, or other grievance, which is common to all of them, affecting each in a similar way, but may not so join when the object of the suit is to restrain that which does a distinct and special injury to each...