State Ex Rel. State Highway Commission v. Donnes

This landowner was very much ill-used by the Yellowstone County jury. On its face, the award for the actual taking is unconscionable. She was awarded $4,815 for an actual taking of 80.3 acres. This averages approximately $60 per acre. If at anytime in 1971, the presumed year of taking, an 80 acre tract in the beautiful lands along the Yellowstone River east of Pompeii’s Pillar were to be sold for $60 per acre, a line of eager purchasers a mile long would have formed to get in on the buy.

This unfair result is because of error that occurred in the course of the trial. The first error was the…