Case ID: ky_34/html/0193-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Chief Justice Robertson", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Reeder vs. Anderson’s Administrators.
    Assumpsit»
    [Mr. Ilord for plaintiff: no appearance for defendants.]
    From the Circuit Court eor Mason County.
    
      June 11.
    When a man loses a piece of property, there is an implied request from him to every body else; to aid him in recovering it; and any one who finds and restores it, may recover of the owner, upon the implied assumpsit, at least an indemnity for his time and expenses-.
   Chief Justice Robertson

delivered the Opinion of the Court.

The only question to be considered in this case, is whether the law will imply a promise by the owner of a runaway slave, to pay a reasonable compensation to a stranger, for a voluntary apprehension and restitution of the fugitive. And, though such friendly offices are frequently those only of good neighborship, which should not be influenced by mercenary motives or expectations—nevertheless* it seems to us that,|£here is an implied request from the owner, to ail other persons to endeavor to secure to him lost property which he is anxious to retrievé; and that, therefore, there should be an implied undertaking to (at least) indemnify any person who shall, by the expenditure of time or money, contribute to a reclamation of the lost property.^

Whether, according to the proof, there was any such claim to reparation or indemnity in this case, is very doubtful: but, because it is doubtful, the Circuit Court erred in instructing the jury to find as in case of a non-suit.

And therefore, it is considered by the Court that, the judgment be reversed, the verdict set aside, and the cause remanded for a now trial.