Editing Detinue (section)

{{Short description|Legal action to recover for the wrongful taking of personal property}}
{{Tort law}}
{{primary sources|reason=Most sources are cases, but their significance in context should be established by secondary sources|date=August 2021}}

In [[tort law]], '''detinue''' ({{IPAc-en|'|d|ɛ|t|ɪ|ˌ|nj|uː}}<ref>{{cite encyclopedia | encyclopedia=[[Oxford English Dictionary]] second edition |title=detinue |url=http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/51287 |access-date=13 January 2019| date=1989 |publisher=Oxford University Press}}</ref>) is an [[Complaint|action]] to recover for the wrongful taking of [[personal property]]. It is initiated by an individual who claims to have a greater right to their immediate possession than the current possessor. For an action in detinue to succeed, a claimant must first prove that he had better right to possession of the chattel than the defendant, and second, that the defendant refused to return the chattel once demanded by the claimant.

Detinue allows for a [[Legal remedy|remedy]] of [[damages]] for the value of the chattel, but unlike most other [[Tortious interference|interference tort]]s, detinue also allows for the recovery of the specific chattel being withheld.<ref>W. S. Holdsworth, ''A History of English Law'' 324-27</ref>