Court Opinion

ID: 9688566
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 17:56:44.487852+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:40.317791
License: Public Domain

HANSON, Judge
(dissenting).
The trial court properly refused to instruct the jury on a landowner's duty to mitigate damages. The rule is not questioned but it has no application to the facts.
*319Defendants owned 155 acres of land in Jackson County seven miles west of Kadoka. In this condemnation action the State acquired 19 acres needed in the construction of Interstate 90. The parcel taken runs along the entire southern section line «destroying all access to the remaining property from the south. The parcel taken also included a house, an old store, sheds, a spring, two wells, four stock dams, and over 400 trees. Defendants were left with 135 acres of bare grassland without a spring, wells, dams, or trees.
There was no allegation of mitigating matters in the Declaration of Taking by the State at commencement of this action as required by SDCL 31-19-23, nor proof of any matter which would justify an instruction relative to a landowner's duty to mitigate. Apparently the State contends the defendants should have drilled a well on their remaining property in order to reduce or minimize damages. However, it failed to show there was a source of potable water available. A Soils Engineer for the State Highway Commission, testified he drilled three 4 1/2 inch test holes to a depth of approximately 35 feet on the land. The first hole was dry, the second "wet", and the third produced «a flow of 1 1/2 gallons of water per hour. In his opinion, the third test hole would provide an adequate well for defendants' needs, if curbed and equipped with a pump. However, other evidence indicated the test holes drilled by the State were all dry at the time of trial and it was not feasible to curb any well producing less than 10 gallons of water per hour. Good water in Jackson County, like gold, was hard to find and the chance of «obtaining an adequate well on the remaining property was «extremely doubtful. Under the circumstances defendants were under no duty to drill costly test wells in a speculative attempt to find an adequate source of water to minimize damages resulting from the taking and it would be prejudicial to so instruct the jury.
A landowner's duty to mitigate damages is not of general or universal application. This is ■ reflected in the following explanatory text statement:
*320"Although an owner is not required to enter upon a doubtful or speculative undertaking, it is his duty, so far as reasonably possible, to attempt to minimize his damages by salvaging what he can from the property taken. Thus, where growing crops are severed or damaged, it is his duty, if he has the opportunity, to care for such perishable property. So also, it is his duty to use all reasonable exertion and steps to protect himself, and avert, as far as practicable, the injurious consequences of the taking. It has been held that an abutting property owner must exercise such care to prevent injury to his property from the cutting down of the grade of an adjoining highway, as may reasonably be expected of a person of ordinary prudence under like circumstances.
"While a landowner is not entitled to recover compensation from the state for damage which he could have avoided, the extent of his duty to minimize the damages depends on the facts of the particular case.
"As a corollary to the rule requiring a landowner to minimize his damages, it is generally held that expenses which he reasonably and in good faith incurs in an effort to minimize his loss are to be taken into account in computing the compensation to be awarded to him in the eminent domain proceeding." 26 Am.Jur. 2d, Eminent Domain, § 155, p. 822. See also Vol. 4. Nichols on Eminent Domain, § 14.22, p. 520.
The cases all support the above text statements and no authority is cited in the majority opinion to the contrary. In other words, the duty to minimize damages particularly applies where some remedial or restorative action will prevent injury, deterioration, damage, loss, or destruction to remaining property such as the duty to harvest growing crops, the construction of dams to prevent flooding, and the like. No such compelling reasons are involved in the present action. The bare grassland would not deteriorate, be harmed, destroyed, damaged, injured, or lost be*321cause the landowners did not actually dig a well. The duty to mitigate damages does not impose a duty to actually restore improvements taken.
The requested instruction implies the landowners had an affirmative duty to do something. In this case, it could only mean they should dig wells. How many exploratory wells would they be obligated to dig? This "duty" portion of the instruction cannot be explained away as an "exercise in semantics", especially to the jury. When a trial is nullified because of failure to give a requested instruction the instruction should, at least, be a clear, correct statement of the law applicable to the facts. The requested instruction goes on to inform the jury that "any expenses which the landowner reasonably and in good faith incurs in an effort to minimize his loss, are to be taken into account in computing the compensation to be awarded him". This would be justified in a proper case where the landowers actually incurred remedial or restorative expenses in an effort to avoid consequential injury, deterioration, damage, or loss to the remaining property. In this case there were no such expenditures and no demand for consequential damages.
The only issue in this case for the jury to consider and determine was the before and after value of defendants' property. The State was not restricted in any manner in its proof or argument as to the availability of water or the cost of producing it on defendants' land. This evidence was all admissible, and was admitted by the trial court, as a reflection on before and after value. From the evidence introduced by both parties the jury could decide whether or not water was available on the land and what it would cost to produce it. They could, and no doubt did, take these important value factors into consideration in their determination of value. It is difficult to see how the State was harmed, restricted, or prejudiced by 'failure to give an instruction which would only confuse the jury. If given on retrial it will be highly prejudicial to the landowners.
I would affirm.
ROBERTS, J., concurs in dissent.