187 Iowa 590 | Iowa | 1919
The landowner did not appeal from the assessment of the sheriff’s jury. The case being docketed in the district court on the appeal of the condemning corporation, and the trial thereof having been begun, the corporation dismissed its appeal. The landowner objected to such dismissal, and insisted upon a trial of the proceeding. The trial court sustained the objection, and denied to the corporation the right to dismiss its appeal. By further proceedings, a larger verdict was rendered in the district court than that rendered by the sheriff’s jury. The first question presented herein for our consideration is, Did the cor
In Ellis v. Carpenter, 89 Iowa 521, which was an appeal by the condemnors from an assessment of damages for establishing a highway, such condemnors dismissed their appeal. In that case, we held:
“They had the undoubted right to do so. We know of no case in which the appellant has not the right to abandon his appeal taken from an inferior court to -a court having appellate jurisdiction.”
As bearing indirectly on the case, we held, in Klopp v. Chicago, M. & St. P. R. Co., 142 Iowa 474, that, pursuant to the statute, the condemnor has the right at any time, even after verdict, to abandon and dismiss the entire proceeding. In other jurisdictions, this right of dismissal is sustained in the following cases: Fall River R. Co. v. Chase, 125 Mass. 483; Wright v. Wisconsin Cent. R. Co., 29 Wis. 341; Upper Coos R. Co. v. Parsons, 66 N. H. 181; Austell v. City of Atlanta, 100 Ga. 182.
We hold, therefore, that the condemnor had a right to dismiss its appeal. The trial court erred in its refusal to recognize such right. It was erroneous, therefore, .to proceed further with the trial. The order entered below is, therefore, reversed, and the cause remanded, with directions to the trial court to permit the dismissal of the appeal. — • Reversed.