Tankersley v. Peabody Coal Co.
Illinois Supreme Court
202 N.E.2d 498 (1964)

- Written by Miller Jozwiak, JD
Facts
George Tankersley (plaintiff) owned a tract of land and leased the surface of the land for farming purposes to John Norville (plaintiff). The Peabody Coal Company (Peabody) (defendant) owned the mineral rights under the land, having taken them over from a predecessor company that had operated a mine. That company dissolved. The mining operations (those of Peabody and the predecessor company) caused surface subsidence in the land. Tankersley and Norville sued Peabody for removing the subjacent support under the land, which caused the subsidence. Peabody claimed pretrial that it could not be responsible for the subsidence caused by the predecessor company’s operations because Peabody had not expressly assumed such liability and had no connection to that entity. The court disagreed, concluding that Peabody could be responsible for such damage. The case went to trial, and the jury returned verdicts for Tankersley and Norville. Peabody appealed, again claiming that it could not be responsible for areas that the predecessor had mined. The intermediate appellate court reversed, applying another case it had recently decided to conclude that successor entities could not be liable for actions of predecessor miners absent express assumption of liability. Tankersley and Norville appealed.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Underwood, J.)
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