pepin v. centonze

CourtVermont Superior Court
DecidedNovember 7, 2023
Docket513-9-01 wncv
StatusPublished

This text of pepin v. centonze (pepin v. centonze) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Vermont Superior Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
pepin v. centonze, (Vt. Ct. App. 2023).

Opinion

STATE OF VERMONT TILED WASHINGTON COUNTY, SS.

13 JUL 2H Pb te

JOHN PEPIN and SANDRA PEPIN )

) SUPERIOR COURT

v. ) Washington gispevibe Coult UNM

) Docket No. S 513-9-01 Wnev

) JOHN P. CENTONZE and ) DONNA CENTONZE )

Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law

This matter came before the court for a final evidentiary hearing on the merits on November 25 and 26, 2002 and February 14, 2003. Additionally, oral argument was heard on May 29, 2003. Plaintiffs were present and represented by Paul S. Gillies, Esq. Defendants were present and represented by Richard W. Darby, Esq.

In this case, ownership of 33 acres of remote woodland in the Town of Waterbury is disputed between Plaintiffs, the Pepins, and Defendants, the Centonzes. Both parties own land adjacent to the disputed area, and each claims that the disputed 33 acres was conveyed to their predecessor in title, through whom they acquired it. They have each petitioned for a declaration of ownership of the 33 acres. Their respective parcels were in common ownership in 1943, and both parties agree that the determining factor in the case is what was conveyed in a 1943 deed in which Belle Cooley conveyed a portion of land she had inherited from her father: if she conveyed the disputed 33 acres as part of the premises included in the 1943 transfer, then the Centonzes own it as part of their parcel; if she did not, then it was included in the remaining lands she continued to own, which were later conveyed to the Pepins’s predecessor in title, in which case the Pepins own it. The Centonzes secondarily assert a claim of ownership based on adverse

. possession.

Findings of Fact

Julius Pixley was Belle Cooley’s father. He acquired two adjacent farms in Waterbury in the late 1800's: the farm assembled by Hutchins, which Julius Pixley acquired from the Hutchins estate in 1883, and the Woodward farm directly south of it, which he acquired in 1895. During his life he sold off three pieces from the Hutchins estate property, leaving a remaining piece of the Hutchins farm located directly north of the Woodward farm. He did not sell any portion of the Woodward farm. When he died in 1940, his daughter Belle Cooley inherited his remaining holdings, which consisted of the remainder of the Hutchins farm, and the Woodward farm. She disposed of what she inherited in three pieces: in 1943, she sold a portion of what she owned to Callahan; in 1949 she sold a portion west of the Waterbury-Bolton road (unrelated to the parties’ dispute) to Holmes; and in 1952, she sold the remainder to Davis. The focus of this case is: what did she sell to Callahan by her deed in 1943? More specifically, did that conveyance include the 33 acres that are now in dispute?

The deed describes the conveyed property as follows:

Being a certain piece of land located on what is known as Woodard Hill in said Waterbury and being what was formerly known as part of the Young farm and the Frink farm so called on Woodard Hill and being part of the land and premises which were conveyed to Julius Pixley during his lifetime by Administrator’s Deed of Arthur Ropes, Administrator of the goods, chattels, and estate of Charlotte M. Hutchins, under date of March 26 AD 1895 and recorded in Book 29 at Page 383 of the Waterbury Land Records. A part of said land and premises were conveyed by J.E. Pixley during his lifetime to S. C. Wheeler by Warranty Deed recorded in Book 31 at Page 8 of the Waterbury Land Records and a part of said land and premises were conveyed to O.C. Atwood by Warranty Deed of J.E. Pixley under date of April 22, 1903 and recorded in Book 31 at Page 217 and a party by J.E. Pixley to Charles Smith under date of April 17 1903 and recorded in Book 31 at Page 216 of the Waterbury Land Records. Meaning and intending hereby to convey all of the land and premises which were conveyed to Julius E. Pixley by Administrator’s deed of Arthur Ropes, Administrator of Charlotte M. Hutchins’ Estate with the exception of the following three parcels of land; Parcel conveyed to O. C. Atwood recorded in Book 31 at Page 217, Parcel conveyed to Charles Smith recorded in Book 31 at Page 216 and parcel conveyed to S. C. Wheeler recorded in Book 31 at Page 8. Part of said land and premises are Lease Land and the Warranties herein contained do not apply to that portion known as Lease Land and the same is subject to an annual rental to the Town of Waterbury in the sum of $2.00.

The parcel of land hereby conveyed is enclosed by fences on all sides and is wood lot and pasture land.

Said land and premises being part of the land and premises which were decreed to the grantor herein by Decree of Probate Court for the County of Washington in the estate of J.E. Pixley, deceased and recorded in Book 49 at Page 83 of the Waterbury Land Records.

Reference is hereby made to the above mentioned deeds, all references therein, to the records thereof and to the Waterbury Land Records for a more

particular description of the land and premises hereby conveyed. (Emphasis added.) Both parties acknowledge that the operative language is what follows the language “meaning and intending hereby to convey. . . ” To figure out what land parcel was being described by the language that follows that phrase, it is necessary to resort to descriptions in prior deeds, which are specifically incorporated into the description by the terms of the last paragraph quoted above. The trouble is that resort to these descriptions does not produce a crystal-clear answer. Three surveyors testified in the case after having done deed research, and their opinions, derived from the same deed research, were not identical.

The Pepins’s position is that because of this lack of clarity, the grantor’s intent can best be derived from the language in the deed that is the most specific and concrete physical description as it relates to the property in 1943: “The parcel of land hereby conveyed is enclosed by fences on all sides and is wood lot and pasture land.” They urge the court to rely on their evidence, which they contend supports the existence of a fence line separating the part that Cooley undeniably conveyed to Callahan and the disputed parcel. The Centonzes argue that the reference to the property being enclosed by fences is merely supplementary identifying information and not the language of conveyance, and that moreover the surveyor they rely on (Towne) found some evidence of a fence along the line they claim further to the south, so they claim that their interpretation of the conveyance clause is also consistent with indications of a fence on the ground at their asserted location. The Pepins claim that the Centonzes’ evidence does not support the existence of a fence because the Centonzes rely solely on the discovery by Towne of only a single 8" strand of barbed wire near a stone pile that was not clearly either a fencepost base or surveyor’s stake and stones, which Towne discovered in 1984, 41 years after the deed. The Pepins’ evidence consists of a four-strand barbed wire fence on trees with many years of tree growth having embedded the wire into the trees, and a continuous line of such fencing sufficient to create an enclosure in the location they propose, with some blazes along that line that were visible before the trees were logged off. The Pepins assert that this evidence is the strongest evidence of Belle Cooley’s intent. Their surveyor, Marsh, also testified that while deed research is inconclusive, he found evidence suggesting that the north line of the Woodward farm is further north than the Centonzes claim, and thus could be where the Pepins’ claimed fence line boundary is.

The Centonzes discount the importance of the fence evidence, and urge the court to rely on the descriptions in the deeds in the land records.

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Related

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pepin v. centonze, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pepin-v-centonze-vtsuperct-2023.