One Man’s Trash Is Another Man’s Treasure
Be careful what you throw away - someone else may be looking for it:
Vestwin Trading Pte Ltd and Another v Obegi Melissa and Others [2006] 3 SLR 573
The case concerns litigation after the defendant collected the plaintiff’s rubbish and then used vital documents found in said rubbish to help support his action. The court held that:
It was untenable for the defendants to contend that the plaintiffs had abandoned the documents by putting them out as rubbish for collection such that they could not assert property rights in the documents. Putting rubbish out for collection by refuse collection personnel was not an abandonment because there was no intent to relinquish the goods absolutely but only conditionally for the purpose of such collection.
The defendants argued that by putting rubbish out for collection the plaintiffs had abandoned the documents and therefore could not assert any property rights in the documents. I agreed with counsel for the plaintiffs that the defendants’ contention was untenable in law.
At common law, the act of putting out rubbish for collection does not amount to an abandonment of property in the rubbish. This precise question was considered in the English case of Williams v Phillips (1957) 41 Cr App Rep 5. In that case, dustmen had removed for their own benefit certain commercially valuable items which they found in the rubbish they had collected. The dustmen were charged with and convicted of theft and appealed to the Court of Appeal. As Goddard LCJ in the English Court of Appeal said at 8:
The first point that is taken here, that the property was abandoned, is on the face of it untenable. Of course, that is not so. If I put refuse in my dustbin outside my house, I am not abandoning it in the sense that I am leaving it for anybody to take away. I am putting it out so that it may be collected and taken away by the local authority, and until it has been taken away by the local authority it is my property. It is my property and I can take it back and prevent anybody else from taking it away. It is simply put there for the Corporation [the employer of the dustmen] or the local authority, as the case may be, to come and clear it away. Once the Corporation come and clear it away, it seems to me that because I intended it to pass from myself to them, it becomes their property. Therefore, there is no ground for saying that this is abandoned property. As long as the property remains on the owner’s premises, it cannot be abandoned property. It is a wholly untenable proposition to say that refuse which a householder puts out to taken away is abandoned. Very likely he does not want it himself and that is why he puts it in the dustbin. He puts it in the dustbin, not so that anybody can come along and take it, but so that the Corporation can come along and take it. (emphasis the Judge’s)
I laughed so much reading this case.
Vestwin Trading Pte Ltd and Another v Obegi Melissa and Others [2006] 3 SLR 573
The case concerns litigation after the defendant collected the plaintiff’s rubbish and then used vital documents found in said rubbish to help support his action. The court held that:
It was untenable for the defendants to contend that the plaintiffs had abandoned the documents by putting them out as rubbish for collection such that they could not assert property rights in the documents. Putting rubbish out for collection by refuse collection personnel was not an abandonment because there was no intent to relinquish the goods absolutely but only conditionally for the purpose of such collection.
The defendants argued that by putting rubbish out for collection the plaintiffs had abandoned the documents and therefore could not assert any property rights in the documents. I agreed with counsel for the plaintiffs that the defendants’ contention was untenable in law.
At common law, the act of putting out rubbish for collection does not amount to an abandonment of property in the rubbish. This precise question was considered in the English case of Williams v Phillips (1957) 41 Cr App Rep 5. In that case, dustmen had removed for their own benefit certain commercially valuable items which they found in the rubbish they had collected. The dustmen were charged with and convicted of theft and appealed to the Court of Appeal. As Goddard LCJ in the English Court of Appeal said at 8:
The first point that is taken here, that the property was abandoned, is on the face of it untenable. Of course, that is not so. If I put refuse in my dustbin outside my house, I am not abandoning it in the sense that I am leaving it for anybody to take away. I am putting it out so that it may be collected and taken away by the local authority, and until it has been taken away by the local authority it is my property. It is my property and I can take it back and prevent anybody else from taking it away. It is simply put there for the Corporation [the employer of the dustmen] or the local authority, as the case may be, to come and clear it away. Once the Corporation come and clear it away, it seems to me that because I intended it to pass from myself to them, it becomes their property. Therefore, there is no ground for saying that this is abandoned property. As long as the property remains on the owner’s premises, it cannot be abandoned property. It is a wholly untenable proposition to say that refuse which a householder puts out to taken away is abandoned. Very likely he does not want it himself and that is why he puts it in the dustbin. He puts it in the dustbin, not so that anybody can come along and take it, but so that the Corporation can come along and take it. (emphasis the Judge’s)
I laughed so much reading this case.