Loggers Beat the Northern Pacific Over Horses Starved in Transit
A Spokane jury awarded Victor and Oscar Pierson $1,999.99 after their horses sickened and died on a railroad car—a verdict the paper said set a costly precedent.
Victor and Oscar Pierson, who are conducting logging operations in the West Branch country of the Kaniksu National Forest for the Fidelity Lumber Co., yesterday were awarded a judgment for $1,999.99 by a jury in a Spokane County court against the Northern Pacific Railway Company. Plaintiffs sued for damages resulting to horses while being transported to this section from Dillon, Mont., by the defendant company. It is alleged that the horses were transported without being fed or watered, which caused sickness from which some of them died. The case has been before the courts for three years and was bitterly fought by the railroad company. It is said that a precedent has been set which will cost the railroads thousands of dollars of damages.
“It is said that a precedent has been set which will cost the railroads thousands of dollars of damages.”
The Pierson verdict shows how railroad power touched even the horses that hauled logs out of the Kaniksu. A jury was willing to hold the Northern Pacific accountable for animals shipped without feed or water, and the paper predicted the case would cost railroads across the region. Modern fights over livestock transport, corporate liability and small operators versus carriers still follow the same arc.
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