Spaulding v. Pouliot

181 P.3d 243, 218 Ariz. 196, 2008 Ariz. App. LEXIS 61
CourtCourt of Appeals of Arizona
DecidedApril 23, 2008
Docket2 CA-CV 2007-0108
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 181 P.3d 243 (Spaulding v. Pouliot) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Arizona primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Spaulding v. Pouliot, 181 P.3d 243, 218 Ariz. 196, 2008 Ariz. App. LEXIS 61 (Ark. Ct. App. 2008).

Opinion

OPINION

BRAMMER, Judge.

¶ 1 This is a dispute between two property owners regarding the use of a road and the ownership of a small, adjacent parcel of land. Appellant, Michael Pouliot, appeals the trial court’s grant of injunctive relief and award of attorney fees and costs in favor of appellee, Pat Spaulding, acting in her capacity as trustee of Stewart Title Trust No. 3610 (the Trust), and its dismissal of his counterclaim. Pouliot argues the trial court erred in dismissing his counterclaim and granting the Trust’s requested injunction, based on the court’s legal determination that the use and possession of land, by a party claiming rights to it by prescriptive easement or adverse possession, are presumed to be permissive. Pouliot further argues the trial court erred in awarding the Trust its costs and attorney fees.

Factual and Procedural Background

¶ 2 The following facts are undisputed. Pouliot owns and resides on a parcel of land adjacent to a large vacant lot in Pima County. Pouliot purchased his parcel in 1996 from Beatrice Redmond, who had purchased it in 1968. Since 1968, Redmond had used an unpaved road over the neighboring vacant lot to access a carport on her property. During that time, she regularly had the road graded. She had also maintained a small parcel of land between the road and her home (the “adjoining parcel”), upon which she kept and maintained a propane tank that provided fuel to heat her home. Shortly after Pouliot bought Redmond’s property in 1996, he built a large garage to replace the carport. He later paved the part of the road he used to access his garage and placed decorative rock on the adjoining parcel. Throughout his ownership, he continued to use and grade the road and to use and maintain the adjoining parcel.

¶ 3 In 1971, John and Emily Aboud purchased the vacant lot next to the Redmond/Pouliot property and visited it periodically over the following three decades. In 2003, the Abouds’ children acquired the lot and placed it in the Trust for their benefit. In 2005, in accordance with A.R.S. § 12-1103(B), the Trust requested that Pouliot execute a quitclaim deed to the portions of the Trust’s property he had been using. Pouliot refused to do so.

¶ 4 The Trust sued Pouliot, alleging he was trespassing on its property. It asked the court to bar Pouliot from further use of the *199 property and to order him to remove the paving from the road. Pouliot answered, claiming he had a prescriptive easement over the road and had acquired title to the adjoining parcel by adverse possession. Pouliot then served and asked the Trust to execute quitclaim deeds to the road and adjoining parcel. 1 After the Trust refused, Pouliot amended his answer to add a counterclaim, asking the court to rule that he had acquired title to the adjoining parcel by adverse possession and had acquired a prescriptive easement over the road. He also requested his attorney fees and costs.

¶ 5 Before trial, Pouliot moved for summary judgment. Despite the Trust’s failure to deny that Pouliot and Redmond had used the road and the adjoining parcel openly, visibly, continuously, and without interference for at least ten years, the trial court denied Pouliot’s motion, stating that unspecified questions of material fact remained.

¶ 6 After a one-day bench trial, the trial court entered judgment in favor of the Trust. It found that, although Pouliot and Redmond had used the road “openly and continuously since 1968” without having received express permission to do so, 2 their use was presumed to be permissive under applicable case law and Pouliot had failed to overcome that presumption as to either the road or the adjoining parcel. Granting the Trust’s request, the court ordered Pouliot to remove the paving, enjoined his further use of Trust property, and awarded the Trust its attorney fees and costs. This appeal followed.

Discussion

Prescriptive easement over road

¶7 Pouliot first argues the trial court erred in determining that, under applicable supreme court precedent, the use of land over which a prescriptive easement is claimed is presumed to have been with the permission of the title-holder. Relying on LaRue v. Kosich, 66 Ariz. 299, 304-05, 187 P.2d 642, 645-46 (1947), the trial court ruled that Pouliot “had the burden of proving that the use was not with the implied permission of [the owner].” The court recognized, however, that an earlier supreme court ease, Gusheroski v. Lewis, 64 Ariz. 192, 167 P.2d 390 (1946), had adopted the opposite presumption. But, because LaRue was decided after Gusheroski and “has never been overruled,” the court applied the presumption it believed LaRue announced. It then concluded Pouliot had “failed to meet his burden of proof that his and his predecessor’s use of the road [was] under a claim of right and hostile to the owner.”

¶8 Pouliot contends the trial court erroneously interpreted LaRue. He asserts LaRue “was fully on board with the Gusheroski holding,” despite the LaRue court’s discussion of the opposite presumption. Pouliot further contends the presumption the trial court applied does not “accurately reflect[] the current state of the law concerning prescriptive easements.” On appeal, we review de novo questions of law, but we will not disturb the trial court’s findings of fact unless they are clearly erroneous. See Sabino Town & Country Estates Ass’n. v. Carr, 186 Ariz. 146, 149, 920 P.2d 26, 29 (App.1996). We will affirm the trial court’s judgment if there is any reasonable evidence supporting it. See id.; Inch v. McPherson, 176 Ariz. 132,135, 859 P.2d 755, 758 (App.1992).

¶ 9 As the trial court noted, our supreme court held in Gusheroski that:

[w]here the claimant has shown an open, visible, continuous, and unmolested use of the land of another for the period of time sufficient to acquire title by adverse possession, the use will be presumed to be under a claim of right, and not by license of the owner. In order to overcome this presumption, thereby saving his title from the encumbrance of an easement, the bur *200 den is upon the owner to show that the use was permissive.

Gusheroski, 64 Ariz. at 198, 167 P.2d at 393, quoting Glantz v. Gabel, 66 Mont. 134, 212 P. 858, 860 (1923). One year later, while discussing Clarke v. Clarke, 133 Cal. 667, 66 P 10, 11 (1901), a California decision that long preceded Gusheroski, the LaRue court did observe that, under the facts of Clarke, “[t]he law ... presume[d] ... that the use was by permission.” But the court nonetheless clearly confirmed in

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
181 P.3d 243, 218 Ariz. 196, 2008 Ariz. App. LEXIS 61, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/spaulding-v-pouliot-arizctapp-2008.