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party notice on
T.
claiming an indemnity against
any damages S. had to pay to the plaintiff, founding
his case on the county court decision. The High
Court awarded the plaintiff damages against both
S. and T. On the third party notice S. sought to
rely on the county court judge's notes of evidence.
Held, that neither the common law nor the Law
Reform (Married Women and Joint Tortfeasors)
Act, 1935, allowed an action to be based on an
estoppel, and in any case the precise questions of
S.'s and T.'s liability to the plaintiff and their
liabilities as against each other for damages to the
plaintiff were not in issue in the county court and
accordingly the third party notice must be dis–
missed. But the judge's notes of evidence could
properly be looked at to see what question was
raised in the previous proceedings. Randolph
v.
Tuck, 105 S.J. 157 ;
(1961) i All E.R. 814, Lawton,
J-
Damage to chattel not on plaintiff's land.
A
plaintiff whose chattel is damaged by the escape of
harmful substances from the defendant's property
can recover damages even though the chattel was
not standing on land of the plaintiff, either on the
basis of the Rylands
v.
Fletcher doctrine or on the
footing of public nuisance from which the plaintiff
has suffered special damage.
The plaintiff lived opposite to a depot owned and
operated by the defendant company. Acid smuts
containing sulphate or sulphuric acid escaped from
the defendant's chimney and damaged the plaintiff's
car while it was standing on the public highway.
There was a continual emission of smells from the
depot which on frequent occasions were particularly
pungent though not injurious to health. Readings
taken outside the plaintiff's house showed a noise
in the evenings of from 64 to 68 decibels from plant
at the depot, and tankers which left the depot in
large numbers produced noise at 83 decibels. Held,
the plaintiff was entitled to damages totalling £235
on all these grounds, and there would be injunctions
suspended for six weeks to restrain the making of
noise at night and the emission of smells at any time
so as to cause a nuisance to the plaintiff. Halsey
v.
Esso Petroleum Co. (1961) i W.L.R. 683 ;
105 S.J.
209.
(1961) 2 All E.R. 145. Veale, J.
Bailment garage car left for repair theft and
damage.
In Cooper
v.
Dempsey (March 21, 1961)
C. took his car to D.'s garage for repairs. D. left it
in his car park, with the ignition key in the switch,
the doors unlocked, and without supervision. The
car was stolen, and later found in a damaged con–
dition as the result of a crash. The Court of Appeal
(Pearce, Harman and Dayies
L.JJ.) held that D. had
failed to- do what a reasonable and prudent man
looking after his own property would have done,
that the damage suffered by C. was not too remote ;
and that D. was accordingly liable to C.
105 S.J.
320.
Limitation of Actions computation of period
date of issue of writ. In Marren
v.
Dawson Bentley
& Co. (March 13, 1961) Havers J. held that the day
on which an accident occurred was to be excluded
from the computation of the period within which an
action should be brought in respect of that accident;
so that a writ issued on November 8, 1957, in respect
of an accident which occurred on November 8, 1954,
was not statute-barred. 231 L.T. 224.
Road Traffic objective test "reasonable doubt".
In Oakes
v.
Foster (April 18, 1961) F. was riding his
motor-cycle along a road at a fairly fast speed.
In
the course of negotiating a sharp left-hand bend the
motor-cycle mounted the kerb, travelled 121 feet
along the footpath, then travelled a further 101 feet
across the road, colliding with a car coming in the
opposite direction. The justices, being of the opinion
that there was a reasonable doubt whether or not
something had happened before the collision which
had caused the defendant to lose control (though
there was no evidence to support such in inference),
dismissed the information charging careless driving.
The Divisional Court (Lord Parker C.J., Hilbery,
Gorman, Salmon and Stevenson J.J.) held,allowing
an appeal, that careless driving must be judged by
the objective test; and that the justices' "reason–
able doubt" was no more than a fanciful doubt.
The Times,
April 19, 1961.
Tort maintenance payment of counsel's fees.
In William Hill (Park Lane)
v.
Sunday Pictorial
Newspapers (1920), (April 14, 1961) W. Brought
an action for maintenance against Sunday Pictorial
alleging
that W. had
suffered pecuniary
loss,
namely the payment of costs to their solicitors,
as
the
result of an unsuccessful
action and
appeal brought against them by L. Sunday Pictorial
Newspapers (1920) had promised to pay L. 200
guineas towards his counsel's fees. Winn J. held
that although the provision of counsel's fees or the
promise to make such provision was maintenance of
a. tortious character, the action failed because special
damage, which was an essential ingredient of an
action for maintenance, had not been proved :
there
was no evidence that L. was caused to continue his
action by the promise of financial assistance, or that
he would have discontinued it had it not been made.
The Times,
April 15, 1961.