James v Foley [1891]

The tenant of a cottage wrongfully refused to give up possession when his tenancy expired. The landlord, who wanted to rebuild the cottage, sent workmen round to remove the roof. However, in the course of their doing so, which waas effected without ay personal violence, parts of the roof unavoidably fell on the tenant’s furniture in the room below and damaged it.

The tenant sued the landlord for trespass and damage to furniture, but lost. The court said that as the tenant had himself been a trespasser as he had had no right to be in the house, any damage which was caused to his furniture was not due to an ulawful act of the landlord but resulted from his own obstinacy in unlawfully refusing to move out. The landlord had not purposely damaged the tenant’s furniture; the object of removing the roof had been to beign demolition of the landlord’s own house, not to damage the tenant’s belongings.

Citation: James v Foley [1891] 1 QB 730