Witte v. Haben

• Decision Date: 05 November 1915
• Docket Number: 19,404 - (68)
• Citation: Witte v. Haben, 131 Minn. 71, 154 N.W. 662 (Minn. 1915)
• Parties: CORNELIUS WITTE v. FRANK E. HABEN
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

154 N.W. 662

131 Minn. 71

CORNELIUS WITTE v. FRANK E. HABEN

Nos. 19,404 - (68)

Supreme Court of Minnesota

November 5, 1915

Action in the district court for St. Louis county to recover $3,000 for false imprisonment. The defense is stated in the opinion. The case was tried before Hughes, J., who when plaintiff rested denied defendant's motion to dismiss the action and a jury which returned a verdict for $800. Defendant's motion for a new trial was granted on the ground that the court erred in its instructions to the jury and the further ground that the damages were excessive. The parties having stipulated that the verdict should be reduced to $400, the former order was vacated, and a new trial was granted solely on the ground that the court erred in its instructions to the jury. From the second order granting defendant's motion for a new trial, plaintiff appealed. Reversed.

SYLLABUS

False imprisonment.

In an action for false arrest and imprisonment it is not a justification that the defendant as a police officer made the arrest upon reliable information that the plaintiff was insane, that the officer in good faith believed this to be true, and that an ordinarily prudent person under the same conditions would have entertained and acted upon such belief the arrest being made without warrant and there being no proof of insanity nor any urgent necessity for restraint even had plaintiff been in fact insane.

John A. Keyes, for appellant.

S. C. Scott, for respondent.

OPINION

HOLT, J.

Action for false imprisonment. Verdict for plaintiff, and from the order granting a new trial he appeals.

In a charge notable for perspicuity and brevity the jury were instructed that the evidence introduced by the defendant to substantiate the alleged justification for the arrest failed as a defense, and that their only duty was to determine and award the actual damages sustained by plaintiff, since all claims for punitive damages were withdrawn. By stipulation the verdict was reduced to $400. The court approved this as a proper amount, but granted defendant's motion for a new trial solely upon the ground of error in the charge.

The defense pleaded was, in short: That defendant was a police officer in Hibbing; that he was advised by the chief of police that plaintiff was carrying a concealed weapon, was acting strangely, and there was some question of his sanity; that defendant was instructed by said chief to arrest plaintiff and hold him in jail until his sanity could be investigated and determined; that defendant was advised by two other persons of certain strange acts of plaintiff; that defendant had reason to believe and did believe that plaintiff was mentally deranged; and that a physician was immediately called to make an examination of plaintiff upon whose advice he was held until the next day when he was released. It was conceded that the arrest was made without a warrant, and was not for any offense committed by plaintiff, or upon suspicion that he had committed a felony.

The learned trial court conceived that the law applied by him in submitting the case, although concededly in accord with text-books and decisions, was not reasonable and should not obtain in this state. He states: "I do not consider the rule that one who arrests another on the ground of mental unsoundness is liable for false imprisonment unless he can prove that the person so arrested was mentally unsound, to be as reasonable as the rule that would require the person making such arrest to show facts and circumstances which would lead an ordinarily prudent man acting without malice to the belief that such person was mentally unsound in other words, that as there was probably cause for believing the person mentally unsound from his actions, conduct, manner of speech, or otherwise, that that would be a sufficient defense to an action for false imprisonment against the one making the arrest. Under the circumstances I am of the opinion that the latter rule should have been given to...