Michaelson v. City of Seattle

Citations

• 63 Wash. 230
• 115 P. 167
• 1911 Wash. LEXIS 1183

Syllabus

<p>Municipal Corporations — Improvements — Assessments — Authority — Property Damaged — Judgment •— Jurisdiction — Presumptions. Under Laws 1905, p. 92, § 22, prohibiting the assessment for benefits of lands found by the jury or court to be damaged, a judgment, on a verdict awarding damages, adjudicating that the land is also liable to assessment, while outside of the ordinary issues provided by statute or settled by the verdict, is not necessarily void for want of jurisdiction appearing on its face, since such adjudication may have been submitted on stipulation or consent, and it is prima facie valid as a judgment of a court of general jurisdiction, although it did not recite the jurisdictional facts authorizing the assessment.</p> <p>Same — Assessments—Judgment—Vacation—Want oe Jurisdiction — Evidence—Admissibility. An action by property owners to cancel an assessment for benefits upon lots which the jury had found to be damaged, in violation of the statutory prohibition, and to vacate that portion of the decree entered on the verdict which adjudicated that the lots were also liable to assessment, on the ground that the same was outside the issues and beyond the jurisdiction of the court, is a direct attack upon the decree; and the plaintiffs are entitled to overcome the presumption of jurisdiction by evidence that such adjudication was not upon any issue involved in the case, that they never had any notice of any such issue, by pleading, or stipulation, or any notice of such portion of the judgment, which would accordingly be void for want of jurisdiction.</p> <p>■ Same — Estoppel to Attack Judgment — -Acceptance of Benefits —Notice. Where a judgment on a verdict awarding damages to lands in a condemnation case also adjudicated that the lands were liable to assessment for benefits, contrary to the prohibition of the statute and without any jurisdiction therefor, the property owners are not estopped to attack the assessment and such adjudication by reason of their