HOUSE FOUNDATIONS DAMAGED

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12483, 26 June 1926, Page 4

HOUSE FOUNDATIONS DAMAGED

BY NEIGHBOUR’S DRAIN JUDGMENT FOR PLAINTIFF. His Honour Mr Justice MacGregor gave judgment for the plaintiff in the Supremo Court yesterday in the tavrV action brought by Hart Spear, of Wellington, eye specialist, against Annie Newham and Clara Rowlett, spinsters, of Wellington, for £250 damages and for an order restraining the dqfenu. ants from discharging water on the plaintiff’s property. The case w “ s heard last week, when Mr T. C. A. Hislop appeared on behalf of tlio plaintiff, and Mr W. J. Crombie on behalf of the defendants. The discharge was stated by the plaintiff to be due to failure to keep in lepair a storm “water drain put in by the defendants or their predecessors in title, and it was stated that the foundations of the plaintiff’s house had become damaged. For the defence K was contended that a drain installed on the plaintiff’s property and considerable excavations were the cause of the soakage. His Honour’s reserved judgment held that the plaintiff’s case liad been established on two grounds, nuisance end negligence, but it was considered thatjustice would he den© by fixing lho damages at £4O, with costs. The damage had been continued since 1000, said His Honour, but it would be absurd to give judgment for the full amount claimed against the defenaants, whose responsibilities commenced only in 1920.