Holm v. County of Cook

283 Ill. App. 190, 1935 Ill. App. LEXIS 55
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedDecember 30, 1935
DocketGen. No. 37,964
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 283 Ill. App. 190 (Holm v. County of Cook) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Holm v. County of Cook, 283 Ill. App. 190, 1935 Ill. App. LEXIS 55 (Ill. Ct. App. 1935).

Opinion

Mr. Justice John J. Sullivan

delivered the opinion of the court.

February 3, 1928, plaintiffs, Fred W. Holm and Bertha Holm, brought an action of trespass against defendant, County of Cook, for damages for injuries to their land and the destruction of their crops by sewage from the Oak Forest Infirmary, a public institution owned and maintained by defendant. When it was disclosed that Fred W. Holm was the sole owner of the premises involved, Bertha Holm. was dismissed as a party plaintiff. A verdict against defendant for $1,750 was returned by the jury May 16, 1934. On defendant’s motion the trial court on June 9, 1934, entered judgment for the defendant and against plaintiff notwithstanding the verdict. This appeal followed.

Plaintiff’s declaration alleged substantially that the County of Cook was a municipal corporation, managed and controlled by the county commissioners of Cook County; that for five years next preceding the commencement of this suit plaintiff owned and was possessed of certain land described therein and was entitled to the undisturbed occupation of same, together with all of its rents, profits, crops and emoluments; that the County of Cook maintained a public institution known as -the Oak Forest Infirmary upon a large tract of neighboring land west of his premises, where it had erected necessary buildings and accommodations for the care of its 6,000 inmates; that for all of said five years defendant allowed the noxious, stinking and poisonous sewage in great volume from the buildings and grounds of this institution to flow upon the land of plaintiff; that it flowed upon his farm and destroyed certain of his growing crops; and that in so doing defendant “has trespassed upon plaintiff’s premises, appropriated and damaged the same for a public purpose without the consent of the plaintiff, and without paying any compensation therefor, and contrary to the rights of the plaintiff in the premises, guaranteed by the Constitution of the State of Illinois, which provides that his property should not be taken or damaged for public purposes without just compensation.”

After its demurrer to the declaration had been overruled, defendant filed a plea of the general issue and two special pleas, of which reliance is placed only upon the following:

“And for a further plea in this behalf, the defendant says that the plaintiffs ought not to have their aforesaid action against it, the defendant, because it says that the plaintiffs heretofore impleaded it, the defendant, in the Circuit Court of the said County of Cook, to the April term of the said court, in the year 1915, in a certain plea of trespass on the case ón promises, to the damage of the plaintiffs of $10,000.00, for taking and using the very same land in the declaration mentioned; and such proceedings were thereupon had in that plea, that afterwards on April 10, 1920, by the consideration and judgment of the same court, the plaintiffs recovered against the defendant the sum of $12,500 damages, as well as the costs of the plaintiffs in that behalf, whereof the defendant was convicted, as by the record thereof still remaining in the same court more fully appears; which said judgment still remains in full force. And this defendant is ready to verify by the said record: Wherefore it prays judgment if the plaintiffs ought to have their aforesaid action, etc. ’ ’

The undisputed evidence shows that sewage from the defendant’s infirmary overflowed a portion of plaintiff’s farm, destroying 20 acres of his yearly crop for ■ the five years alleged, with resulting damage to plaintiff of nearly twice the amount of the jury’s verdict.

On the trial of this cause defendant introduced in evidence the pleadings in a prior action between the same parties and the judgment therein against defendant for $12,500, which was averred in its special plea as a bar to this action. The land described in the instant case was included in the description of the land ■involved in plaintiff’s former action against defendant, wherein his declaration filed April 9, 1915, alleged substantially the same facts as to the erection and maintenance, of the Oak Forest Infirmary by the county; that defendant took and used plaintiff’s farm tiling and a right-of-way across his premises for the disposition of the sewage of the infirmary; and that plaintiff’s land and improvements were decreased in value by reason of said taking and using as a matter of public necessity." It is admitted that the judgment for $12,500 in the former action, after it was affirmed by this court and certiorari denied by the Supreme Court, was paid. It was on the basis of this former recovery and satisfaction that the trial court entered the judgment for defendant, notwithstanding the verdict of the jury.

Plaintiff contends that a former recovery in an action of trespass against the county is not a bar to his recovery for a second trespass.

Defendant’s theory is “that, since it is liable in a tort action only when it has taken or damaged land, then when it has taken or damaged land and paid for such appropriation, it thereby acquires an absolute right to continue to dominate the land for the same uses and purposes forever afterward.”

Plaintiff urges that “it would be very disastrous and far-reaching if it were the law that a trespasser, by reason of his trespass upon the property of another, obtained a legal right or title or interest in the property of the owner by reason of his wrongful and unlawful act, and the aggrieved owner could not thereafter recover for any subsequent trespass.”

It is sufficient answer to this argument to state that plaintiff predicates and he must predicate the county’s liability entirely and solely on the constitutional provision that, “Private property shall not be taken or damaged for public use without just compensation” (sec. 13, art. 2, Constitution of the State of Illinois) which contemplates only one recovery for all past, present and future damages.

Plaintiff’s argument as above set forth would possess merit and force if his former suit and the instant action were against, a private individual or corporation and for damages caused by a temporary nuisance. However, his former action not only was brought under the above constitutional provision, but he alleged permanent injury in that defendant did “take and use the said farm tiling of this plaintiff and the right-of-way across the plaintiff’s premises for the disposition of the said sewage into the ditch of the said Calumet Drainage District, for a public purpose, and wrongfully, without making any just compensation to the plaintiff”; that said sewage “has so sealed and filled the pores in the said tiling, that the same is wholly destroyed for the use for which it was intended, namely, of absorbing the moisture in the soil of plaintiff’s lands, and that the various chemicals and moisture in said sewage, has leaked into and leaks through the soil of the plaintiff so as to saturate the same and render the same unfit for the purpose of cultivation, and incapable of producing vegetation.” That this court in its opinion affirming the $12,500 judgment in the' former case (Holm v. County of Cook, 213 Ill. App. 1) considered the injuries alleged to have been sustained by plaintiff as permanent is apparent from the following language of the court on pp. 4 and 5:

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10 Ill. Ct. Cl. 524 (Court of Claims of Illinois, 1939)
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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
283 Ill. App. 190, 1935 Ill. App. LEXIS 55, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/holm-v-county-of-cook-illappct-1935.