Walker Lands, Inc. v. E. CARROLL POLICE JURY

871 So. 2d 1258, 2004 WL 785082
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedApril 14, 2004
Docket38,376-CA
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 871 So. 2d 1258 (Walker Lands, Inc. v. E. CARROLL POLICE JURY) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Walker Lands, Inc. v. E. CARROLL POLICE JURY, 871 So. 2d 1258, 2004 WL 785082 (La. Ct. App. 2004).

Opinion

871 So.2d 1258 (2004)

WALKER LANDS, INC. and Hollybrook Land Company, Inc., Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
EAST CARROLL PARISH POLICE JURY and The State of Louisiana, Defendants-Appellants.

No. 38,376-CA.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Second Circuit.

April 14, 2004.
Rehearing Denied May 6, 2004.

*1260 Louisiana Department of Justice by Gary L. Keyser, Asst. Attorney General, for Appellant, State of Louisiana.

McGlinchey Stafford, PLLC by James C. Crigler, Jr., Constance Charles Willems, New Orleans, for Appellee, Walker Lands, Inc.

Paul Loy Hurd, Monroe, for Waterways Access Association.

Before BROWN, CARAWAY & PEATROSS, JJ.

PEATROSS, J.

This appeal arises from a trial court judgment in favor of Plaintiff Walker Lands, Inc. ("Walker Lands") and against Defendant State of Louisiana ("State"). The State now appeals the judgment of the trial court. For the reasons stated herein, we affirm in part, reverse in part and remand.

FACTS

On June 10, 1996, Walker Lands filed suit seeking an injunction against the East Carroll Parish Police Jury to stop all public *1261 use of Gassoway Lake and a drainage ditch which runs into the lake, both in the vicinity of the Mississippi River. In its lawsuit, Walker Lands also sought a declaratory judgment from the trial court declaring that Walker Lands is the owner of Gassoway Lake and that the lake and the drainage ditch are not subject to any right of public use.[1] Subsequently, the East Carroll Parish Police Jury filed a third-party demand against the State alleging that the State was an indispensable party to the suit, since it had a duty to defend title and access to alleged public lands.[2]

The State answered this lawsuit claiming the ownership and/or servitude to the bed, bottoms and waters of Gassoway Lake and the drainage ditch;[3] and, therefore, Gassoway Lake and the drainage ditch were subject to public use. The State and Walker Lands also claimed ownership of land that the State labels as an island, that sits between the lake and the Mississippi River.

A trial over these matters was held in 1999 and 2001. The trial court received extensive evidence from both parties concerning the creation and ownership of Gassoway Lake. At trial, it was determined that Gassoway Lake did not exist in 1812,[4] the year Louisiana was admitted into the Union. The land where Gassoway Lake now sits was either woods or farmland in 1812, west of the Mississippi River. When the Mississippi River shifted westward before approximately 1880, it flowed over this dry land. When the Mississippi River shifted eastward, private riparian landowners acquired the land, which includes Gassoway Lake and the drainage ditch, and have owned it ever since, with Walker Lands having purchased the land in 1974. Since 1960, all owners of the land and Gassoway Lake have prohibited access to it.

Dr. Richard Kesel, expert for Walker Lands, testified that, based on map evidence, data concerning the course and flow of the Mississippi River and other information, Gassoway Lake was in existence by 1894. During the 1860s and 1870s, the Mississippi River began moving in a westward direction toward the geographical site now occupied by Gassoway Lake. Dr. Kesel opined that the land was created through alluvion or accretion when the Mississippi River moved slowly and imperceptibly back eastward, leaving behind dry land and what is now Gassoway Lake in a shallow swale.[5] Gassoway Lake is a *1262 very shallow lake and its depth has not changed since its formation. Currently, the channel of the Mississippi River is approximately three and a half miles east of Gassoway Lake. Gassoway Lake remains landlocked during most of the year and is practically inaccessible by boat.[6] The lake only receives water when the Mississippi River floods, which causes water to run through the ditch and eventually spilling over into the lake. The drainage ditch runs from the southern end of Gassoway Lake to Bunch's Cutoff, another body of water. At low water, which is at 77 feet, the ditch is mostly dry and the land that sits between the lake and the Mississippi River is mostly dry. A levee on the land blocks the Mississippi River from flooding any more dry land west of Gassoway Lake. At times when the Mississippi River floods, the land owned by Walker Lands, including Gassoway Lake, is submerged under the waters of the Mississippi River, below the ordinary high water mark, which is 112 feet, all the way to the base of the levee. When the Mississippi River is not at an elevated state, however, the land and Gassoway Lake remains well above the ordinary low water mark of the Mississippi River.[7]

The trial court found that, according to the 1894 map, Gassoway Lake was formed as a shallow swale. In making such a finding, the trial court rejected the conclusion found in a Louisiana Attorney General Opinion[8] that Gassoway Lake was created as a result of a neck cut-off; the testimony of the State's expert, Dr. Paul Kemp, who opined that Gassoway Lake was created as a result of chute cut-off, as described in La. C.C. art. 503,[9] within the alluvial plain; and that the lake was formed out of the former Mississippi River bed. Dr. Kemp testified that the area where Gassoway Lake is located was the main channel of the Mississippi River in 1881 and that, when the Mississippi River moved eastward, it left alluvion deposits against the west bank of the river, with Gassoway Lake as a feature within the alluvion build up, which cut it off from the Mississippi River, but that it remained a channel for the Mississippi River.

The trial court ultimately rendered judgment in favor of Walker Lands, concluding that Gassoway Lake and the drainage ditch are privately owned by Walker Lands because the lake and ditch are not navigable in fact; and, thus, not navigable in law. In addition, the trial court determined that certain land between Gassoway Lake and the Mississippi River was not an island and was owned by Walker Lands.[10] Further, the trial court found that the State has never claimed this land in the *1263 past and cannot now do so. Thereafter, the trial court entered a permanent injunction enjoining the State or the general public-at-large from going on or about Gassoway Lake, the land between Gassoway Lake and the Mississippi River and the drainage ditch which runs into the lake. The State now appeals the judgment of the trial court, raising the following assignments of error[11] (verbatim):

1. The trial court erred in its adoption of the final judgment written by Walker which prohibits public navigation on waters of the Mississippi and awards Island No. 1, formed in the Mississippi, to Walker;
2. The trial court erred in disregarding all relevant and competent evidence and in rendering a judgment contrary to the law of Louisiana and long standing public policy;
3. The trial court erred in refusing to grant the State a suspensive appeal where all procedures were followed, and the trial court simply nullified the request without consent of the parties and a hearing; and
4. The trial court erred in maintaining a TRO in effect from 1996 to present, despite the reversal of a prior judgment by the Court of Appeal, Second Circuit and remand to the trial court for a full trial.

DISCUSSION

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
871 So. 2d 1258, 2004 WL 785082, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/walker-lands-inc-v-e-carroll-police-jury-lactapp-2004.