North Coast Railway Co. v. Hess

Citations

• 56 Wash. 335
• 105 P. 853
• 1909 Wash. LEXIS 899

Syllabus

<p>Eminent Domain — Proceedings — Proper Parties — Mortgagee and Lienors. Under Bal. Code, § 5638, providing that notice in condemnation shall he served on the owner, encumbrancer or tenant or person otherwise interested in the land, mortgagees, lien claimants, and a city having a lien for assessments, are proper parties defendant.</p> <p>Same — Lienors—Right to Award — Equitable Right of Company to Discharge of Claimants Not Parties. Where, in condemnation proceedings, the railway company failed to make a mortgagee and lien claimants parties defendant, and they failed to come in voluntarily under Bal. Code, § 5644, and claim an interest in the award of damages, their liens against the property were not affected by an award of damages for the full value of the land, paid into court; hut they have the same rights in equity against the fund representing the land as they had against the land, and as though they had been claimants under the statute; hence the railway company, having paid full value, had an equitable right, irrespective of statute, to be protected against the liens through proper control of the funds in court; and it was error to order the fund paid to the owners without' discharge of the liens, against objection by the company.</p> <p>Same — Right of Tenants. In such a case, a specific sum awarded to the tenant in possession as the value of his leasehold may properly be ordered paid to him.</p>