Watts v. Billings Bench Water Assn.

Appeal from judgment in favor of plaintiff in an action for damages for the destruction of crops by the breaking of defendant’s irrigation canal.

The defendant is the owner of a large ditch or canal constructed some nineteen years prior to the injury complained of for the purpose of diverting water from the Yellowstone River to and upon lands, owned or controlled by stockholders in the association. North of the city of Billings this canal follows the base of a high bluff or “rim-rock” and from its south bank the ground slopes precipitately to the valley below. On this slope, at a considerable…