Transition: Pierson Liesner Trying to Identify “Magic Moment” When Object Changes from Unowned to Property.

Transition: Pierson Liesner

• Trying to Identify “Magic Moment” When Object Changes from Unowned to Property



• Fights Between 1st & 2d Hunter:– If Object Unowned, no Q that 2d Hunter Wins– Issue: Had 1st Hunter Done Enough to Get

Property Rts Before Intervention



• Fights Between 1st & 2d Hunter:– If Object Unowned, no Q that 2d Hunter Wins– Issue: Had 1st Hunter Done Enough to Get

Property Rts Before Intervention

• Legal Rules Here Temporal Not Comparative


Pierson Suggests Two Ways Besides Actual Physical Possession to get Property rights in Wild Animals:


Pierson Suggests Two Ways Besides Actual Physical Possession to get Property Rights in Wild Animals:

1. MORTAL WOUNDING (Liesner)

2. NETS & TRAPS (Shaw)

IRON DQ13: Application of Pierson to Facts of Liesner

ASSUME TRIAL COURT FACTS CORRECT:

1. Ps mortally wounded animal, pursued

2. Escape Improbable, if not impossible

3. D then shot & killed, took animal






APPLY LANGUAGE FROM PIERSON






APPLY LANGUAGE FROM PIERSON






APPLY POLICIES FROM PIERSON:

• Reward Effective Labor






APPLY POLICIES FROM PIERSON:

• Certainty? (Mortal Wound as Creating Property)

1914

1914: DEATHS

• Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain (Civil War Hero)

• John Muir (Naturalist)• Jacob Riis (Journalist/Author)• 19th Century Industrialists

– CW Post (Grape Nuts & Other Cereals– George Westinghouse (RR Brake and

Electronics)– Frederik Weyerhauser (Timber & Paper)

1914: BIRTHS

• Alec Guiness

• Bert Parks

• Joe Louis

• Joe DiMaggio

• Ralph Ellison

• Howard K. Smith

1914: Introduced in US:

• term “Birth Control” (coined by Margaret Sanger)

• First Blood Transfusion• Doublemint chewing gum• Elastic Brassiere • Federal Trade Commission • Co. that will become Greyhound Bus • Mother’s Day (by Congr. Resolution)

1914: Introduced in US:

• New Republic Magazine

• Panama Canal

• Pygmalion by GB Shaw

• Rookie Pitcher: Babe Ruth

• Tarzan of the Apes

• Teletype Machine

• Traffic Lights using red-green signals

1914: World War I:

• Sept. 5: 1st Battle of the Marne Begins

• Dec. 24-25: Christmas Truce

1914: World War I:

• June 28: Archduke Francis-Ferdinand Assassinated in Sarajevo: The Shot Heard Round the World

DIRECTED VERDICT

• Trial Court Rules That Insufficient Evidence to Meet Relevant Legal Standard Was Presented to the Jury

DIRECTED VERDICT

• Trial Court Rules That Insufficient Evidence to Meet Relevant Legal Standard Was Presented to the Jury

• Two Possible Grounds for Appeal– Trial Court Applied Wrong Legal Standard– Evidence Was Sufficient to Meet Legal

Standard

DIRECTED VERDICT: LIESNER

• Last Time: D Conceded Relevant Legal Standards, So Must Be Claiming That Evidence Sufficient to Raise Jury Q

DIRECTED VERDICT: LIESNER

Unusual Case:• Directed Verdict for Plaintiff

• Trial Record appears to contain factual disputes

• Trial Court must have believed that undisputed evidence proved P’s case

DQ15. What test does the court appear to apply as to

when a trial court should grant a motion for directed verdict?

The evidence in this case very strongly tends to establish all the facts requisite to ownership of the wolf by plaintiffs,—so strongly that all reasonable doubts in respect to the matter, if any would otherwise have remained, might well have been removed by the superior advantages which the trial court had. In the light of other evidence, all reasonable doubts may well have been removed as to who delivered the shot which so crippled the animal as to cause him to cease trying to escape ….


IMPLICIT LEGAL TEST IN WISCONSIN (1914)

Trial court can direct a verdict for a party if uncontested evidence removes all reasonable doubts that the party’s claim has been proven.

What facts precisely does Wanie claim were

not proved beyond a reasonable doubt?

“That … the plaintiffs were in vigorous pursuit of the game, the evidence is clear, and that in a few moments, at most, they would have had actual possession, is quite as clear.”

“In the light of other evidence, all

reasonable doubts may well have been

removed as to who delivered the shot

which so crippled the animal as to cause

him to cease trying to escape ….”

Claim Must Be:

There was sufficient evidence that other people’s shots might have hit the wolf or that the Liesners’ shots didn’t hit it to create reasonable doubts that the shot that mortally wounded the wolf was fired by one of the Liesners.

ISSUE

Did TCt err by directing verdict for ptff because dfdt offered sufficient evidence to create a reasonable doubt about who fired the shot that mortally wounded the wolf, thus gaining ownership of it?

STATEMENT OF THE CASE

• Liesner and another, who mortally wounded a wolf, sued Wanie, who subsequently killed and took the wolf, seeking recovery of the wolf.

• Liesner and another, who first shot a wolf sued Wanie, who subsequently killed and took the wolf, seeking recovery of the wolf.

STATEMENT OF THE CASE

• Liesner and another, who mortally wounded a wolf, sued Wanie, who subsequently killed and took the wolf, seeking recovery of the wolf.

• Liesner and another, who first shot a wolf sued Wanie, who subsequently killed and took the wolf, seeking recovery of the wolf.

FACTS

• Plaintiffs mortally wounded a wolf and pursued it to the point that escape was improbable, if not impossible. D then shot & killed the wolf and took the carcass.

• The Trial Court found that Plaintiffs mortally wounded a wolf and pursued it to the point that escape was improbable, if not impossible. D then shot & killed the wolf and took the carcass.

DQ15. Is the court certain that the test for directed verdict

was met in this case?


HOLDINGNo, the Trial Court did not err by directing a verdict for the plaintiff

because all reasonable doubts may well have been removed as to who

fired the shot that mortally wounded the wolf, thus gaining ownership of it.

The evidence in this case very strongly tends

to establish all the facts requisite to

ownership of the wolf by plaintiffs,—so

strongly that all reasonable doubts in respect

to the matter, if any would otherwise have

remained, might well have been removed

by the superior advantages which the trial

court had.

IRON

DQ16. What are “the superior advantages which the trial court had”?

IRON

DQ16. What are “the superior advantages which the trial court had”?

• Visual Observation of Witnesses

• Hearing Testimony

She asked me to take her

to the dance.

16. What do these advantages suggest about the appropriate role of

the appellate court in reviewing factual determinations made by juries

or trial judges?

DEFERENCE!!

RATIONALES

• Not a lot in a narrow case reviewing sufficiency of the evidence.

• Might give substantive rule as a doctrinal rationale.

• Might give “superior advantages” as a policy rationale

“Prevailing rule”: Property in wild animal created if one has “substantially permanently deprived [animal] of his liberty—had him so in their power that escape was highly improbable, if not impossible….” “The instant a wild animal is brought under the control of a person so that actual possession is practically inevitable, a vested property interest in it accrues which cannot be divested by another’s intervening

and killing it.” LEAD: DQ17: Meaning of

Vested? Of Divested?

Example of Property Right We’ve Discussed That is

Contingent (As Opposed to Vested)?

Example of Property Right We’ve Discussed That is

Contingent (As Opposed to Vested)?

RATIONE SOLI


and killing it.”

COMPARE POSSIBLE RULES

1. Actual Possession Likely

2. Actual Possession Practically Inevitable

3. Actual Possession Inevitable





LEAD: DQ17: Policies Supporting Choice of #2?





LEAD: DQ17: Policies Opposing Choice of #2?


and killing it.” LEAD: DQ17: Evidence Needed to

Prove? Look at Key Language

Transition: Pierson Liesner Trying to Identify “Magic Moment” When Object Changes from Unowned to Property.

Documents