The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1899-02-22
Legal Flaw VIII Result in
Long Litigation.

very important decision bearing
upon the taking of lands in the great
water basin by the metropolitan water
commission, has been handed down bv
Judge Aiken, the case at issue being
that Of Barnes against the common
wealth of Massachusetts.
The case was in order for a hearing
before Judge Aiken at the last session
of the jurywaived court, and the at
torney general made a motion to have
the case dismissed on the ground that
1t was brought in the wrong court,
that it should have been entered in the
supreme court.
This petition for a dismissal of the
case is in itself dismissed.
Since Attorney General Knowlton
filed motions in the suits which had
been entered in she superior court by
Clinton property holders and those in
the great metropolitan water district,
there has been q good deal of discus
sion upon the matter, and the excite
ment which followed the explosion of
this legal bomb, has scarcely yet sub
sided. By special legislative enact
ment, 1t was provided that certain spe-
cif1c cases arising from land damages
in the metropolitan water district
should be entered in the supreme court.
while Judge Corcoran and other legal
talent had entered their petitions for
damages in the superior court, the pc
titions covering claims for hundreds of
thousands of acres of land taken in the
county.
The decision by Judge Aiken has Civ
en- new phase to the matter, and the
cases will be watched with even keen
er interest in the future, inasmuch as
innumerable suits growing out of the
metropolitan takings have been en-
tered in the wrong court, while Law
yer Frank l.. Dean of this city, who
appeared for the plaintiff in the case
at hand, had entered his suit, which
equally involves acts of the water COM
mission In the basin district, in the
proper court.
What further action after this disaI-
loWance of Attorney General Knowl-
toms petition for dismissal, will be
taken remains to be seen.
The plaintiff in the present suit is a
lady who owns property in Milford,
and 1t is claimed by her that a spring
was seized by the METROPOLITAN water
commission and a pipe laid therefrom
to one of the settlements of laborers to
furnish them with a water supply.
He etCfore this spring had served as a
water supply for a small village of PEG
pie, and after the springs We're tapped
at their source by the metropolitan
water commission. the supply for the
village became exhausted. According
~, she filed through her counsel, Mr..
Dean, a petition in the superior court
for the assessment of damages for the
tapping of the springs.
The legislative enactment which
bears directly upon the land seizures
of the metropolitan water commission
and provides that cases arising there
from shall be entered in the supreme
court, specifies those cases brought to
recover for damages to the property by
the taking Of the waters of Nashua
river, and for damages to land by the
taking OF property for the basin itself.
It further specifies that other cases
arising from land takings shall be en-
tered in the superior court. In the
framing of the BILL the conditions
which would result from the commits
sion's operations were anticipated so
fir as possible, but the particular phase
had not been anticipated, and Judge
Aiken holds with Lawyer Dean that
the case was rightly brought in the
superior court.