## Facts

- Homeowners lived next to a grocery supermarket operated by Winn-Dixie and managed by John Lloyd in Sumter, South Carolina.
- The supermarket began operations on October 1, 1959; the homeowners sued about six weeks later.
- Plaintiffs alleged the store’s *location* was improper and its *operation* interfered with use and enjoyment of their home through late-night unloading noise and lights, exhaust fans blowing toward their property, floodlights shining onto their home, late-night trash and street-sweeping activity, increased traffic and vehicle fumes, and debris/trash escaping onto their land.
- The store complied with municipal zoning and permitting requirements for a retail grocery.
- The trial court awarded plaintiffs $5,000 in actual damages and denied a permanent injunction.
- Defendants’ directed-verdict motion (no nuisance shown) and new-trial motion (challenging, among other things, property-depreciation testimony) were denied; defendants appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether a supermarket that complied with municipal zoning and permitting could constitute a private nuisance based solely on its location.
2. Whether the evidence required a directed verdict for defendants on the nuisance claim concerning the store’s operation.
3. Whether a new trial was required because damages evidence (including depreciation in property value) was admitted and considered without limiting the jury to legally actionable nuisance conditions.

## Decision

- The court held the supermarket’s lawful, municipally authorized location could not be treated as a nuisance on these facts.
- The court affirmed the denial of a directed verdict only as to certain operational allegations that could amount to an actionable nuisance (fans blowing toward plaintiffs’ property, floodlights shining onto their property, and trash escaping onto their property), because those claims presented a jury question.
- The court concluded that other complained-of conditions (such as ordinary traffic effects and municipal trash removal or street sweeping) could not support nuisance liability under the evidence presented.
- The court reversed the denial of a new trial and remanded, requiring a new trial so that damages would be assessed only in connection with the operational conditions that could legally constitute a nuisance.

## Legal Principles

- A business that satisfies municipal requirements and is not inherently harmful or unlawfully constructed is not a nuisance merely because of its location.
- A lawful business may still be a private nuisance if operated in an unreasonable manner that unreasonably interferes with neighboring owners’ use and enjoyment of their property.
- Damages, including diminution in property value, are recoverable only upon proof of an actionable nuisance; where some alleged interferences are not legally cognizable, damages proof and submission must be limited to the actionable conditions.

## Conclusion

The court distinguished between a lawfully sited supermarket (not a nuisance per se) and specific unreasonable operational interferences (potential private nuisance), and ordered a new trial because the damages case was not properly confined to the limited operational conditions that could support nuisance liability.


Winget v. Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc., 242 S.C. 152, 130 S.E.2d 363 (S.C. 1963)