Knight v. Hirbour

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Smith, J.:

This was an injunction suit involving the possessory right to a corpse. The plaintiff in error is an undertaker. In January, 1900, a man was killed by the cars in the city of Topeka. Plaintiff in error took possession of the body without authority of any of the friends or kin of the deceased. Upon learning that the dead man had relatives in Ohio, and that it would be necessary to send the body there for burial, the plaintiff in error, under the claim that in such cases the rules of the board of health required the remains to be encased in a…