Distress damage feasant explained

Distress damage feasant is a common law self-help legal remedy whereby a person who is in possession of land may impound a chattel which is wrongfully on that land to secure the payment of compensation for damage caused by it.^[1] It is part of the law relating to distraint. In some cases the party also has the right to sell the chattel. The chattel may be inanimate, or it may be an animal or livestock.^[2]

Any livestock had to be distrained at the time, before they left the land. No cause in distress would stand if the landowner was in any way responsible for allowing the trespass, such as failing to fence off the land.^[3]

The remedy principally relates instances of nuisance, and was often exercised in conjunction with certain strict liability torts, such as liability under the rule in Rylands v Fletcher or cattle trespass. In a number of instances, the exercise of the remedy has now been curtailed by statute.^[4]

Notes and References

1. Web site: Distress Damage Feasant. Irwin Law. 19 December 2016.
2. Web site: Damage Feasant. Oxford English Living Dictionary. 19 December 2016.
3. Book: Smith, Josiah W. . 1880 . A Manual of Common Law for Practitioners and Students: Comprising the Fundamental Principles and the Points Most Usually Occurring in Daily Life and Practice . 9th . Stevens and Sons . 534 . Distress for damage feasant: An owner or occupier of land may seize animals and chattels injuring or trespassing upon his land, and detain them until a fair compensation for the injury is tendered to him, unless they are under the personal care and the immediate control of some one. But he must distrain them at the time, and before the leave his land. If however, the trespassing of cattle is owing to the fault of the owner of the land, in not fencing where he ought, and there is no default on the part of the persons in charge of the cattle, no distress can be made..
4. See for example, Web site: Animals Act 1971., section 7(1).