Court Opinion

ID: 9658948
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 21:23:36.046162+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:02.137559
License: Public Domain

HAWTHORNE, Justice
(dissenting).
I cannot subscribe to any rule that limits the amount of recovery by the owner to the amount received by one who has taken his property in legal or moral bad faith. Such a rule permits the wrongdoer to fix the quantum of damages which the owner can recover by the use which he makes of the property. For example, under such a rule the thief who steals virgin merchantable timber of a size suitable for manufacture into lumber can, by cutting the timber so-stolen into firewood and selling it as such at a fair market value, limit the amount of recovery to the price received by him.
I am still of the view that the damages awarded in this case are inadequate for the reasons given in my concurring-dissenting opinion on original hearing.