Case ID: pa-super_51/html/0395-02.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Henderson, J.,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Breneman v. Mylin, Appellant.
    
      Contract — Breach of contract to lease — Damages—Landlord and tenant.
    
    In an action to recover damages for failure to deliver possession of a dwelling house which the defendant had leased to the plaintiff, no damages can be recovered for injuries to furniture hauled over a rough road or for injuries to the furniture after it had been stored in a house a long distance from the demised premises, where the evidence shows that the plaintiff knew some time before the beginning of his term that the tenant in possession would not go out, and there is no evidence to show that there was any necessity for the plaintiff to take the furniture where he did, or over the rough road on which he took it, or to take it in the condition as to packing in which it was.
    
      Argued Nov. 16, 1911.
    Appeal, No. 50, Oct. T., 1911, by defendant, from judgment of C. P. Lancaster Co., June T., 1909, No. 27, on verdict for plaintiff in case of Harry A. Breneman v. Aldus C. Mylin.
    Before Rice, P. J., Henderson, Morrison, Orlady, Head, Beaver and Porter, JJ.
    Reversed.
    Assumpsit to recover damages for breach of contract. Before Hassler, J.
    At the trial it appeared that the plaintiff on July 9, 1908, leased to the plaintiff a dwelling house in the village of Willow Street. The plaintiff was to have possession on April 1, 1909, but the tenant in possession refused to surrender the premises. This fact was known to plaintiff in February, 1909. Plaintiff nevertheless hauled his furniture to the house, and afterwards hauled it away again to his father's house over a rough road and there stored it. He claimed that the furniture was injured both in the transportation and in the storing.
    When the plaintiff was on the stand he was asked this question:
    “Q. Were or not your goods injured and depreciated in value by reason of your being obliged to store them as you have just described? ”
    Mr. Hensel: That is objected to.
    Admitted. Defendant excepts. Bill of exceptions signed and sealed.
    “A. They were very much. Q. In what way?”
    Mr. Hensel: Objected to. Admitted. Defendant excepts. Bill of exceptions signed and sealed. [2]
    “A. They were scuffed and scratched. We didn’t have the proper place to put a great many of them. We had to store them too much together in order to get them under roof in the dry. Q. Were any of them exposed to the elements and weather, or anything of that kind? A. The wagons. One wagon was. Q. What was the difference or depreciation in the value of your household goods by reason of the injuries they sustained on account of this change?”
    Mr. Hensel: That is objected to on the ground it is irrelevant and incompetent.
    The Court: Let him answer.
    Defendant excepts. Bill of exceptions signed and sealed. [3]
    “A. Not worth any more than half as much now because they have all been scratched up. Q. Give it in figures as near as you can. You said they were worth about $400. What would be the loss? A. The furniture I had at that time, of course, I got some new since. Q. I know, but the loss to the furniture you had there? A. That would not be worth more than about $200 after it came through all that. Q. How much would the loss be? A. About $200.”
    The court charged in part as follows:
    [You can only allow him such sums of money as will actually compensate him for any loss he has sustained, or amounts he has expended.
    He tells you that his furniture was worth $400 before, and now is only worth $200, and has explained to you that this depreciation in its value is due to its having been injured by reason of hauling and by reason of having stored it since April 1, 1909. That would be an item for you to consider.
    He has had to pay $70.00 storage for his furniture. This you can consider as an item of damage.] [5]
    Verdict and judgment for plaintiff for $175. Defendant appealed.
    
      Errors assigned were (2, 3) rulings on evidence, quoting the bill of exceptions, and (5) above instructions, quoting them.
    
      W. U. Hensel, with him L. N. Spencer, for appellant,
    cited: M’Clowry v. Croghan, 1 Grant, 307; Lanigan v. Kille, 97 Pa.-120; Smart v. Allegaert, 14 Phila. 179; Balias v. Wolff, 11 Pa. Superior Ct. 150.
    
      B. F. Davis, for appellee,
    cited: Kircher v. Sprenger, 4 Pa. Superior Ct. 38; Thuemler v. Brown, 18 Pa. Superior Ct. 117; Bradley v. McHale, 19 Pa. Superior Ct. 300.
    October 14, 1912:
   Opinion by

Henderson, J.,

A large part of the damage claimed by the plaintiff was for injury to his furniture caused by hauling it over a rough turnpike road from the leased premises to his father’s house and for injury to the furniture while in storage at the latter place. Evidence was introduced to show the plaintiff’s loss in this respect, and the admission of this evidence is covered by the first, second and third assignments. The compensation which the plaintiff could lawfully claim under the most favorable circumstances would be that resulting from the injury which naturally and ordinarily followed the breach of the contract set up; or that which was in the contemplation of the parties when the contract was executed; or such as might in the ordinary course of things be expected to follow its violation: Billmeyer v. Wagner, 91 Pa. 92; Bradley v. McHale, 19 Pa. Superior Ct. 300. It would be a wide stretch of imagination to suppose that these parties took into consideration the possibility that the plaintiff would so deficiently pack his furniture or transport it over so rough a road that it would be subjected to the detriment alleged and that a consequent liability would be imposed on the defendant; or that having been removed to the premises of the defendant’s father it would be so stored as to be subjected to additional damage. These are not direct consequences of the breach alleged. Whether the furniture was injured to any extent, when being hauled from the plaintiff’s former residence to the premises leased from the defendant is not very clearly shown, but assuming that all the damage was produced in taking it from the latter place to the home of the plaintiff’s father the case lacks evidence that there was any necessity on the plaintiff to take it where he did or. over the rough road on which he took it or to take it in the condition as to packing in which it was. It nowhere appears that he might not have hired a suitable place for storage in the immediate vicinity or that he made an effort to secure such a place and failed. It is to be observed also that the plaintiff knew some time before the beginning of the term provided for in his lease that the tenant then in possession would not go out, and in loading his goods and hauling them to the place which he wished to occupy and of which he had reason to believe he could not obtain possession he unnecessarily subjected his furniture to the injury described. The case is not presented in any view which, we think, makes admissible the evidence relating to the damage to the furniture. The first, second and third assignments and as much of the fourth as relates to the subject of damage to the furniture must therefore be sustained.

The judgment is reversed with a venire.