Your mission, should you choose to accept it: read Henderson v. City of Columbus, No. A-11-060 (Apr. 3, 2012), without creating bad puns about what a “crappy” or “stinky” case it must have been.
Why? Well, in that case, the Nebraska Court of Appeals held that the failure of the city’s sewage “lift station” after a heavy rain storm and the resultant flooding of the Hendersons’ “downstream” property with sewage could result in inverse condemnation. Nasty.
The most interesting part of the opinion begins on page 686, and discusses inverse condemnation in the context of these type of cases. The court rejected the argument that the property owner must prove the city was negligent, only that the city owned the sewer system, and the trial court concluded a city employee’s actions caused the sewage backup.
Long opinion, very detailed. Check it out.
Mission Accomplished.