The court was asked as to how it should value goods which had disappeared, and where the plaintiff sought damages for their wrongful detention, either as at the date of the detention or as at the date of the judgment.
Held: Damages for detinue were to be based on the value of the item at the time of the judgment. Lord Evershed MR said in the course of answering: ‘it is further to be noted that the action of detinue was essentially a proprietary action implying property in the plaintiff in the goods claimed’, and then a reference is made to Viner’s Abridgement vol 8 p23 and Holdsworth, History of English Law vol 7, pp 438 and 439. ‘ It was, and still is, of the essence of an action of detinue that the plaintiff maintains and asserts his property in the goods claimed.
I think that the rights of the plaintiff as regards these goods were not such as entitled him to bring an action in detinue against the defendant, in whose possession they were, as agent, as the time, of the person in whom the property in the goods was then vested’.
Judges:
Lord Evershed MR
Citations:
[1946] KB 374
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Iran v The Barakat Galleries Ltd QBD 29-Mar-2007
The claimant government sought the return to it of historical artefacts in the possession of the defendants. The defendant said the claimant could not establish title and that if it could the title under which the claim was made was punitive and not . .
Cited – Carlton Greer v Alstons Engineering Sales and Services Limited PC 19-Jun-2003
PC (Trinidad and Tobago) The claimant had bought an expensiv agriucltural tool (a hoe) from the defendants. It was defective and her returned it repeatedly for repair. Eventually they refused to allow him to test . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Torts – Other, Damages
Updated: 08 April 2022; Ref: scu.258520