Robert B. Williamson

The case concerned Portland residents and property owners who sought to challenge a city council zoning change via referendum but were blocked by an ordinance requiring all petition signatures to be made in person at the City Clerk's office. Plaintiffs claimed this rule discriminated against those prevented by age, illness, or business from traveling there, violating equal protection under the Maine Constitution and the Fourteenth Amendment. The court first confirmed the plaintiffs' standing based on their personal inability to sign, then assumed their facts true and examined the ordinance's purpose. It concluded that the in-office signing requirement was a reasonable anti-fraud measure applying equally to all voters, not arbitrary or oppressive, and therefore constitutional. The appeal was denied.

electionscivil rights

This case involved a dispute over title to land in Deer Isle, Maine, where the plaintiffs, heirs of the original owner John Davis, acquired the property through two tax deeds from the town after it was lost due to unpaid taxes. The plaintiffs brought an action to quiet title under 14 M.R.S.A. §§ 6655-6658, which requires proving four years of uninterrupted possession claiming a freehold estate, but the lower court also applied 36 M.R.S.A. § 946 (the tax title statute) to bypass the possession requirement and ruled in their favor. The defendants appealed, arguing errors in the findings on possession, the applicability of the tax title statute, and the burden of proof. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court sustained the appeal, holding that the two statutes are distinct and cannot be mixed; since the complaint was filed under the quieting title statute, the plaintiffs had to meet its possession requirement, which they did not, and the tax title statute's provisions (including no need for possession) do not apply. The court noted that the plaintiffs could pursue a separate action under the tax title statute, which also provides for jury trials unlike the quieting title action.

propertytaxesprocedure

This case concerned a trespass dispute in which the defendant entered the plaintiffs' land in Bath, Maine, and cut a chain that blocked access, claiming a right to use an alleged public way known as the 'old county road' or 'winter ferry' road that ran to an upper cove on the Kennebec River. The plaintiffs argued that any such road was never legally established, had the wrong terminus, or had been abandoned. The trial justice, sitting without a jury, ruled for the plaintiffs and awarded nominal damages of $1, finding that even if the road had once existed as a public easement, it had been abandoned after ferry operations ceased nearly 150 years earlier. On appeal, the court upheld the judgment under the clearly erroneous standard, holding that the finding of abandonment was supported by the record and made findings on establishment or location unnecessary. The court also rejected the defendant's separate claim as an adjacent landowner, noting that any private easement merged and ended when the parcels were under common ownership.

propertytorts & liability

The case concerned holders of bonds issued by School Administrative District No. 3 who challenged P. & S. L., 1963, c. 175, a law removing three towns from the district. The plaintiffs sought and received a declaratory judgment that the Act was unconstitutional because it impaired the obligation of the bonds, plus injunctive relief against its enforcement. The court determined that the bonds were secured by taxation across the entire district and by the right to levy on residents' property, and that excising the three towns reduced this security without bondholder consent. The opinion addressed severability of invalid provisions but concluded the core changes violated the contract clause.

business & regulatorytaxes

The case was a suit by Universal C.I.T. Credit Corporation, an indorsee and holder in due course of a negotiable promissory note, against the makers Lawrence and Rosalie Cyr to recover on the note. The defendants raised a defense of fraud in the execution by the payee, claiming they did not know they were signing a note and were not negligent. A jury found for the defendants, but on appeal from denial of a motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict, the court examined whether the defendants were negligent as a matter of law. The court concluded that the defendants were negligent because they signed plainly labeled documents including a note without reading them, estopping them from asserting the fraud defense against a holder in due course under the Uniform Negotiable Instruments Act. The court therefore sustained the appeal and remanded for entry of judgment for the plaintiff.

business & regulatory

In Pettengill v. Turo, plaintiffs sued their neighbors for damages after the defendants raised the grade of a shared driveway without adequate drainage, causing water to flood the plaintiffs' yard, pollute their well, damage their septic system, and kill trees; the dispute centered on whether this constituted obstruction of a watercourse or mere surface water and involved issues like the plaintiffs' standing after conveying the property and an alleged accord and satisfaction. A jury awarded the plaintiffs $4,000, including $300 for trees and $1,000 in punitive damages, while rejecting the defendants' counterclaim. On appeal, the court upheld the verdict as to the trees and punitive damages but ordered a limited new trial on damages for the well, leaching bed, and yard, holding that the yard damage assessment lacked a proper basis in depreciation of usability or rentability and that the overall verdict risked double-counting or legal misconception. The court rejected claims of accord and satisfaction, mortgagee ownership barring recovery, and certain evidentiary and instructional errors, while applying Maine rules on new trials and appeals.

propertytorts & liabilityprocedure

The case involved a defendant convicted of night hunting who appealed the denial of his motion for a directed verdict of acquittal. The court reviewed whether the evidence presented at trial was sufficient for the jury to find guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Testimony showed the defendant driving slowly at night in an area with deer, using a spotlight on fields and orchards, with a rifle, ammunition, and multiple spotlights in the car. The court held that this evidence, both direct and circumstantial, supported the jury's verdict and excluded other reasonable hypotheses of innocence. The exceptions were overruled and the judgment for the State was affirmed.

criminal law