People v. Reed

33 P.2d 879, 139 Cal. App. 258, 1934 Cal. App. LEXIS 534
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedJune 14, 1934
DocketCiv. No. 9165
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 33 P.2d 879 (People v. Reed) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering California Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Reed, 33 P.2d 879, 139 Cal. App. 258, 1934 Cal. App. LEXIS 534 (Cal. Ct. App. 1934).

Opinion

STURTEVANT, J.

The defendant George H. Harlan has appealed from the amended judgment, from the order [260]*260permitting tbe amendment to tbe judgment and from an order refusing to dismiss tbe action.

For some time prior to tbe commencement of tbe action tbe defendant and bis wife were tbe owners of a parcel of land containing twenty acres, wbicb was located on tbe border of Richardson Bay in Marin County. Through the division of highways of tbe department of public works the plaintiff planned tbe construction of a cut-off as a part of tbe Redwood highway. The cut-off was laid out on a line extending north and south and passing over the western end of the lands so owned by the defendant. When the action was commenced the defendant’s land was surrounded by other tracts owned by certain private individuals. It was marsh-land and was in part covered by water two and one-half feet deep at low tide. The plan for constructing the highway over the land of the defendant and for a distance north of his lands and for a distance to the south of his lands consisted of a causeway resting on wooden piles at an elevation of 28 feet above high tide. The plaintiff’s complaint is in the ordinary form and recites the adoption by the California highway commission of a resolution to the effect that two hundredths (2/100) of an acre, describing it by metes and bounds, be taken from the defendant.,, After, the defendant was served he appeared and filed a demurrer. At the same time he prepared a deed containing a reservation as follows:

“Reserving unto the parties of the first part the right of ingress to and egress from any highway, bridge or embankment constructed over or across the same at grade, for the purpose of obtaining ingress to and egress from Tide Land Block 311 for all purposes, and to erect such ramps or fills as the parties of the first part, their successors or assigns, may be advised, in order to make proper connections at grade with the aforesaid state highway for the purpose of obtaining such ingress to and egress from the said Tide Land Block 311 from said state highway.” He also prepared a notice of motion to dismiss. Thereafter the motion was heard and denied.

The action was tried by the trial court sitting with a jury. In its findings the court adopted the verdicts of the jury and made additional findings. Among others it made a finding as follows:

[261]*261‘'The court finds that the allegations contained and the issues raised in the answer and supplemental answer of defendant George H. Harlan with respect to said defendant’s proposed methods of ingress to and egress from his said land to and/or under the causeway upon which the plaintiff has constructed a state highway and/or to any of the property heretofore acquired by the plaintiff for highway purposes are physically possible, but that said methods of ingress and egress as proposed therein by said defendant would hinder the public in its use of the said causeway and/or land heretofore acquired by plaintiff for state highway purposes, as aforesaid, and injure the said causeway upon which said state highway is .situated; that any connection made by said defendant to provide means for ingress to and egress from his said land to and/or under said causeway and/or to said property of plaintiff heretofore acquired for highway purposes will be incompatible with the greatest public good and benefit.
“That upon the first separate special defense set up in defendant’s answer the court finds that the lands of the defendant George H. Harlan were before the commencement of this action, and now are, surrounded upon all sides by lands belonging to others, that on the north the lands of said defendant are bounded by the lands of F. G. Bartnett, on the northeast by the lands of Bandolph Petterson, on the southeast by the lands of Union Trust Company and R. L. Coleman, on the southwest by the lands of the State of California, and that said defendant then had and now has no rights for a roadway over the lands of any of said adjoining owners, and that the only means of connecting the lands of said defendant with a public road in the County of Marin is over, across and through the said strip of land proposed to be condemned by plaintiff.”

Among the conclusions of law was one as follows: ‘ ‘ That said defendant shall not be allowed ingress to and egress from his said land or to make any physical connection whatsoever to or under the causeway upon which plaintiff has erected a state highway and/or to any property heretofore acquired by the plaintiff for state highway purposes.”

Thereafter an interlocutory decree was signed and entered January 12, 1932. A final order of condemnation was signed and entered January 22, 1932. No appeal was taken [262]*262from the interlocutory decree nor the final decree. Thereafter the plaintiff gave notice and later it made a motion to amend the interlocutory decree and to amend the final order. The motion was granted and to each decree a paragraph was added as follows:

“It is further ordered, adjudged and decreed that said defendant shall not be allowed ingress to and egress from his said land or to make any physical connection whatsoever to or under the causeway upon which plaintiff has erected a State Highway and/or to any property heretofore acquired by the plaintiff for state highway purposes.”

As recited above the defendant has appealed from the order allowing the amendments and has appealed from the decree as so amended.

The defendant complains because the trial court did not grant his motion to dismiss the action, but we find no error in the ruling. The reservation contained in the deed would have given to the defendant the right to attach to the causeway which the plaintiff was about to construct an intersecting causeway. To do that the defendant had no absolute right. Whether under all of the facts he should be granted that privilege, or a different one, was a question of fact to be determined in another proceeding by the proper tribunal. To present the legal questions involved in motion to dismiss was not the proper procedure. (Forrester v. Lawler, 14 Cal. App. 170 [111 Pac. 284].)

He also attacks the order made by the trial court permitting the plaintiff to amend the interlocutory decree and the final order by causing them to conform to the decision as shown by the findings of fact and conclusions of law. The point has no merit. (Takekawa v. Hole, 170 Cal. 323, 327, 328 [149 Pac. 593].)

The defendant contends that in legal effect the last paragraph of the judgment is an injunction precluding him from ever constructing and putting in place a way of ingress to and egress from the west and that that portion of the judgment was in excess of the power of the trial court. We think that point must be sustained for several different reasons. The parcel of land over which the plaintiff sought to condemn a right of way included two-hundredths (2/100) of an acre. As to that parcel the record is free from error. That parcel was a part of a larger tract containing [263]*263twenty (20) acres. The lands so owned by the defendant, but over which the right of way would not run, were not damaged, as we understand the findings, if the new highway did not operate to preclude ingress and egress. The right of ingress to and egress from such land was a property right. (Strehlow v. Mothorn, 100 Cal. App. 692 [280 Pac.

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Bluebook (online)
33 P.2d 879, 139 Cal. App. 258, 1934 Cal. App. LEXIS 534, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-reed-calctapp-1934.