Union Traction Co. v. Pfeil

78 N.E. 1052, 39 Ind. App. 51, 1906 Ind. App. LEXIS 106
CourtIndiana Court of Appeals
DecidedNovember 2, 1906
DocketNo. 5,836
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 78 N.E. 1052 (Union Traction Co. v. Pfeil) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Union Traction Co. v. Pfeil, 78 N.E. 1052, 39 Ind. App. 51, 1906 Ind. App. LEXIS 106 (Ind. Ct. App. 1906).

Opinion

Black , J.

This was a proceeding instituted hy the Indianapolis Northern Traction Company, of which the appellant is the successor, for the appropriation, under the statute, of land for the way of an electric street and interurban railroad through agricultural lands of the appellees. The appellant presents for review the action of the court below upon certain instructions.

1. In one of the instructions given the court told the jury that, in determining the amount of damages, they should not consider or make any allowance for the benefits “which may have resulted, or may be supposed to result in the future, to defendants or to their said lands by reason of the construction of said electric railway by plaintiff, for the purposes for which this appropriation is made, through the community in which defendants’ lands are located. The law excludes any such benefits or supposed benefits from consideration in cases of this kind.” Since the bringing of this appeal we have had occasion in a number of cases to consider the question presented in this instruction. See Indianapolis, etc., Traction Co. v. Dunn (1906), 37 Ind. App. 248; Indianapolis, etc., Traction Co.v. Ramer (1906), 37 Ind. App. 264; Carrell v. Muncie, etc., R. Co. (1906), 38 Ind. App. 700. While a comparatively large portion of appellant’s brief is given to this question, it is not improper to say that in a recent oral argument of the cause it was not pressed by the appellant, probably because of those intervening decisions, to which we still adhere.

[54]*542. [53]*53The appellant objects here to the seventh instruction given at the request of the appellees, because in mentioning [54]*54therein certain circumstances which, it was said, if they existed, might be considered by the jury, the court did not expressly confine such consideration to matters shown by the evidence to exist, and also on the ground that the instruction invited the indulgence of conjecture and the consideration of speculative and fanciful damages, and further because the instruction permitted consideration of inconvenience and danger, if any, to the owner or his family, in crossing the track and right of way of the appellant. The circumstances which the jury were thus permitted to consider were not submitted to them as separate and additional elements of damages, but the jury were told that they might consider them, if they existed, in determining the extent of the damage, if any, to the remainder of the farm, as affecting the extent of the depreciation in the value of the land, if any. Eo particular circumstance of those referred to in the instruction is specifically designated by the appellant as being objectionable, except that relating to inconvenience and danger to the owner “or his family,” emphasis being placed on the last three words, and no objection being urged against the additional words “or his stock,” in the instruction.

[55]*553. [54]*54It is stated by the appellees in their brief that there is abundant evidence on all the points suggested in the instruction, and this statement is not contradicted by the appellant, nor is it claimed as to any matter referred to in the instruction that there was no evidence relating to it. In an instruction given at the request of the appellant the court told the jury, among other things, that they should, in their deliberations, agree upon and find no damages for the appellees “until you can agree and find that a preponderance of all the evidence in the case sustains and justifies you in believing that a particular sum will be a fair measure of compensation and damages to which” the appellees “are entitled.” In an instruction given at the request of the appellees the jury were told that it was their [55]*55duty to render a verdict in accordance with the law applicable to the case, as stated to them by the court, and in accordance with the evidence, as it had been given under the direction of the court in the trial of the cause; that they were not at liberty to disregard either the law or the evidence as thus placed before them, and were not at liberty to follow their own opinion, if contrary to the law or evidence so given. In other instructions, given at the request of the appellant, the jury were told, that they could not allow any damages in this case which were remote, imaginary, uncertain, and conjectural or speculative in their nature, even though testified to by witnesses; that the damages must be such and only such as would compensate the appellees for their actual pecuniary loss; and the damages were limited expressly by instructions given at the request of the appellant to the fair market value of the land taken for the right of way, the damage to the remainder of the farm, and the value of the crops, if any, growing on the right of way when possession was taken, and destroyed by appellant.

4. The instructions must be considered as a whole, and the jury would not be misled by the mere omission from the seventh instruction above mentioned of words expressly limiting their consideration to such matters therein referred to as were shown by the evidence. This would be especially true where there was, in fact, evidence relating to all such matters. And so far as the references in the instruction were general, the jury would understand from the instructions as a whole that such references did not extend to merely conjectural or speculative losses. A party complaining here of an instruction given to the jury should be able to show how he was substantially injured by it. The seventh instruction above mentioned does not appear to have been materially erroneous. See Indianapolis, etc., Traction Co. v. Dunn, supra; Indianapolis, etc., Traction Co. v. Ramer, supra.

[56]*56Objection is made to the tenth instruction given at the request of the- appellees, wherein, after referring to the fact that the appellant’s attorneys in cross-examination of witnesses of the appellees had been permitted to ask the witnesses what was the value per acre of certain portions of the farm of the appellees, taken separately, after the appropriation, the court instructed that these questions were proper only as a means of testing the knowledge of the witnesses as to the value of the land of the appellees concerning which they had testified, and to disclose the manner in which the witness arrived at his estimate of value and the basis thereof, and for no other purpose.

5. The land in question consisted of sixty-five acres in one body, used as a farm by its owners, the appellees, and the railroad ran across it diagonally. In such case the damages should be considered and assessed for the entire farm (Chicago, etc., R. Co. v. Huncheon [1892], 130 Ind. 529), and an instruction was asked by the appellant, and given, in which the value of the land to be considered by the jury was said to be the price for which the real estate would have sold in a body. See 3 Elliott, Railroads, §§995, 1038.

3.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
78 N.E. 1052, 39 Ind. App. 51, 1906 Ind. App. LEXIS 106, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/union-traction-co-v-pfeil-indctapp-1906.