Spohn v. Dives
| Decision Date | 27 March 1896 |
| Docket Number | 121 |
| Citation | 174 Pa. 474,34 A. 192 |
| Parties | Catharine Spohn, Kate Eyrich, Charles Spohn and Solomon Spohn v. Josiah Dives and George S. Pomeroy, trading as Dives, Pomeroy & Stewart, Appellants |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
Argued March 3, 1896
Appeal, No. 121, July T., 1895, by defendants, from judgment of C.P. Berks Co., Nov. T., 1893, No. 88, on verdict for plaintiffs. Affirmed.
Trespass for injuries to plaintiffs' building. Before ENDLICH, J.
At the trial it appeared that the plaintiffs are the owners of a lot of ground in the city of Reading, running from Penn street to Cherry street, upon which buildings are erected. On the Cherry street end stand two small brick houses, Nos. 609 and 611 Cherry street. Adjoining on the western side is the lot of the defendants, about 60 feet in width. In 1892 the defendants constructed a large building on the Cherry street end to correspond with the store already standing on the Penn street end.
The evidence tended to show that the defendants' excavations were carried very considerably beneath the level of plaintiffs' foundation; that some of the soil underneath plaintiffs' foundation fell out; that no measures whatever looking towards the support of plaintiffs' wall were taken by defendants until part of the soil supporting it on defendants' side had been removed, nor indeed, until the wall showed signs of giving way, and the chimney attached to the kitchen had actually fallen; that afterwards two horizontal props were run in under the brick part of the wall, upheld on defendants' property and in plaintiffs' cellar by perpendicular posts; that at some time, other props, two or three or more in number, were placed against the wall slanting upwards from defendants' property; that neither of these expedients taken alone, nor both of them applied simultaneously, were reasonably sufficient, according to described customary methods, to protect the structure from injury by sinking, and that it was so injured.
Defendants presented, among others, the following point:
2. Under all the evidence in the case the verdict should be for the defendant. Answer: Declined. [2]
Verdict for plaintiffs for $850. Judgment for $500.
Error assigned among others was (2) above instruction, quoting it.
Judgment affirmed.
Jefferson Snyder, of Baer & Suyder, A. K. Stauffer with him, for appellants, cited: McGettigan v. Potts, 149 Pa. 155; Richart v. Scott, 7 Watts, 460.
J. H....
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Walker v. Strosnider
...Co., 2 S. D. 285, 49 N.W. 1054; Id., 3 S.D. 44, 51 N.W. 1023, was similar, and the judgment in that case was affirmed. In Spohn v. Dives, 174 Pa. 474, 34 A. 192, the court said the case was for the jury, since the tended to show that defendant's excavations were carried considerably beneath......
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Walker et al. v. Strosnider.
...v. Railwuy Co., 110 Mo. 234; Obert v. Dunn, 140 Mo. 476; Booth v. Railroad Co., 140 N. Y. 267; Ketchum v. Newman, 141 N. Y. 205; Spohn v. Dives, 174 Pa. 474; Witherow v. Tannehill, 194 Pa. 21; Foley v. Wyeth, 2 Allen 131; Bonapart v. Wiseman, 89 Md. 12; Railroad Co. v. Reaney, 42 Md. 117; R......
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Lugin v. Dobson
...way surprised as to the theory of the case being tried. The decree is affirmed at the costs of the defendants. 1 In accord: Spohn v. Dives, 174 Pa. 474, 34 A. 192; Witherow v. Tannehill, 194 Pa. 21, 44 A. 1088; Irvine v. Smith, 204 Pa. 58, 53 A. 510; Cooper v. Altoona Concrete Construction ......
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Michelsen v. Upton
...for the resulting injury to the adjoining land. See 1 Am.Jur.2d, Adjoining Landowners, s. 72, p. 742. The plaintiffs cite Spohn v. Dives, 174 Pa. 474, 34 A. 192, wherein the court held: 'One who makes an excavation upon his own land deeper than the foundation of the building upon an adjoini......