Case Title: Piven v. Comcast

Citation: 397 Md. 278

Docket Number: 48/06

State: maryland

Court: Maryland Supreme Court

Date: 2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

Document:
Sylvia B. Piven, et al. v. Comcast Corporation, et al., No. 48, Sept. Term, 2006.
VENUE – IMPROPER JOINDER
IN AN ACTION FOR TRESPASS TO LAND LOCATED ENTIRELY IN THE
COUNTY WHERE THE ACTION IS BROUGHT, IT IS NOT PERMISSIBLE TO JOIN
AN ACTION FOR A SEPARATE TRESPASS TO LAND LOCATED ENTIRELY IN A
DIFFERENT COUNTY WHEN THE TWO PARCELS ARE NOT CONTIGUOUS OR
UNDER COMMON OWNERSHIP AND HAVE NO OTHER CONNECTION WITH
EACH OTHER.
In the Circuit C ourt for Ba ltimore Co unty
Case #03C040057810C
IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF MARYLAND
No.  48
September Term, 2006
______________________________________
SYLVIA B. PIVEN, ET AL.
v.
COMCAST CORPORATION, ET AL.
______________________________________
Bell, C.J.
Raker
         *Wilner
Cathell
Harrell
Battaglia
Greene,
   JJ.
______________________________________
Opinion by Wilner, J.
______________________________________
Filed:   February 9, 2007
*Wilner, J.,  now retired, participated in the
hearing and conference of this case while an active
member of this Court; after being recalled pursuant
to the Constitution, Article IV, Section 3A, he also
participated in the decision and adoption of this
opinion.
 
1 The named defendants were the Comcast Corporation, a Pennsylvania
corporation with its principal office in Philadelphia; Comcast of Maryland, a Colorado
corporation with its principal office in Philadelphia; Comcast of Baltimore City, L.P., a
limited partnership with its principal office in Denver; Comcast of Baltimore City, Inc., a
Maryland corporation; Comcast Telephony Communications of Maryland, a Maryland
corporation; Comcast of Delmarva, a Delaware corporation with its principal office in
Miami; Comcast Business Communications, Inc., a Pennsylvania corporation with its
principal office in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania; Comcast of Howard County, a Maryland
corporation; Comcast Cable of Maryland, Inc., a Delaware corporation with its principal
office in Philadelphia; Comcast of Harford County, L.L.C., a Maryland corporation;
Comcast of Maryland Limited Partnership, a Maryland limited partnership; Comcast of
Elkton, Inc., a Delaware corporation with its principal office in Englewood, Colorado;
Comcast Phone of Maryland, Inc., a Colorado corporation with its principal office in
The issue before us is whether, in an action for trespass to land located solely in
one county, it is permissible to join an action for trespass to land located solely in a
different county when the two parcels of land are not contiguous and have no common
ownership.  The Circuit Court for Baltimore County said “no,” the Court of Special
Appeals said “no,” and we shall say “no.”
BACKGROUND
In May, 2004, Sylvia Piven, a resident of, and owner of real property located solely
in, Baltimore County, and Stanley and Donna Chaplinski, residents of, and owners of
property located solely in, Baltimore City, filed an action in the Circuit Court for
Baltimore County against fifteen named Comcast companies and 99 unnamed “John Doe
Comcast Corporation[s]” one or more of which were alleged to have unlawfully placed or
directed the placement of one or more cables or wires across the plaintiffs’ land without
the plaintiffs’ permission.1  The action purported to be a class action on behalf of not only
Englewood, Colorado; Comcast Cable Communications, Inc., “perhaps, a Delaware
entity” with its principal office in Philadelphia; Comcast of Eastern Shore, Inc., a
Delaware corporation with its principal office in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and every other
Comcast or related entity, currently unidentified that “does, or may have, liability for the
matters complained of herein,” which the plaintiffs refer to as “John Doe Comcast
Corporation 1 - 99.”
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Piven and the Chaplinskis but “all persons who own property (or otherwise control the
relevant possessory interest in the property)” upon which any of the defendants, whom the
plaintiffs referred to collectively as Comcast, had run wires as alleged.  That would
include plaintiffs and property throughout the State; the complaint alleges that the class is
“composed of thousands, and possible tens of thousands, of members.”
The complaint contained three causes of action.  Count I was for trespass – that by
stringing its wires across the plaintiffs’ properties without permission from the plaintiffs
who own those properties, one or more of the various Comcast defendants entered upon
the land unlawfully, intruded upon the respective plaintiffs’ possessory interest in the
land, and caused them to suffer unspecified damages.  As relief, the plaintiffs asked for
compensatory damages, an injunction either granting the plaintiffs legal ownership of the
wires over their property or requiring Comcast to remove the wires, interest, and
attorneys’ fees.  Count II, which incorporated all of the previous averments relating to the
trespass, sought damages for unjust enrichment, the basis for which was that it would be
inequitable for Comcast to retain the benefit conferred on it by its unlawful use of the
plaintiffs’ property.  Count III, which also incorporated the previous averments, was
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characterized as an action to quiet title.  It, too, was based on the claim that Comcast had
“substantially interfered with one or more exclusive possessory property interests” held
by the plaintiffs.  Counts II and III sought precisely the same relief as Count I.
The complaint alleged that venue lay in Baltimore County under Maryland Code
“§ 6-201 et seq.” of the Courts and Jud. Proc. Article (CJP) on the theory that “either this
jurisdiction is a venue applicable to all Defendants; or, if there is no single venue
applicable to all Defendants, one (or more) of them may be sued in this venue” and that
each defendant is engaged in “a vocation in this jurisdiction.”
The defendants moved to dismiss the complaint on both venue and jurisdictional
grounds, and, in the alternative, asked for a more definite statement of facts.  As to venue,
they asserted that “[c]laims involving distinct properties located in different jurisdictions
and owned by different plaintiffs cannot be combined in one jurisdiction.”  The motion
for a more definite statement asked that the plaintiffs be required to state what lines the
plaintiffs were complaining about, whether they were above or below ground, whether
they were connected to utility poles, and whether the lines originated or terminated on the
plaintiffs’ properties.
The court conducted a hearing on the motion in January, 2005.  At that point, no
class had been certified, so the court treated the action as involving only the named
plaintiffs – Ms. Piven, whose property was in Baltimore County, and the Chaplinskis,
whose property was in Baltimore City.  After hearing from counsel and consulting the
2 We need not address here whether any of the three counts could be brought as a
class action.
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relevant statutes, the court found merit in both the venue objection and the request for
more definite facts.  It concluded that the actions sounded in trespass, which was a local
action that had to be brought in the county where the land was located, and that it was
impermissible to bring, or join, a claim for trespass to property in Baltimore City in an
action in Baltimore County.  The court granted the motion to dismiss, but with leave to
amend, to provide facts as to the specific properties involved, including whether the
Comcast lines are alleged to run over or under the property and what Comcast specifically
did to the property.  The court made very clear to counsel that the Chaplinskis’ claim
could not be filed in Baltimore County and that if the Chaplinskis’ claim was joined in
any amended complaint without a certification of a class, the amended complaint would
be dismissed.2
The plaintiffs promptly filed an amended complaint that, in most respects, was
virtually identical to the initial one.  Although there were some additional allegations
regarding the various defendants, the Chaplinskis’ claim, despite the court’s earlier ruling
and warning, was once again included.  That produced another motion to dismiss which,
after a hearing, the court granted, this time without leave to amend.  Noting again the fact
that no class had been certified (and musing whether, in light of the Class Action Fairness
Act of 2005 (Pub. L. No. 109-2, 119 Stat. 4, and, in particular, 28 U.S.C. § 1453), the
3 Our references to those statutes are to the current version of them.  In 2005, the
Legislature made some non-substantive style changes to § 6-203.  See 2005 Md. Laws.
ch. 464, § 3.
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case would remain in State court if the proposed class were to be certified), the court
continued to treat the issue as simply whether an action for trespass to real property
located in Baltimore City could be filed in Baltimore County, and its answer continued to
be “no.”  In a reported opinion, the Court of Special Appeals affirmed, holding that the
issue was governed by CJP § 6-203(b)(1)(iv), which requires that an action for trespass to
land be brought in the county where all or any portion of the land is located, and that an
action for trespass to land in Baltimore City simply could not be brought in Baltimore
County.  Piven v. Comcast, 168 Md. App. 221, 895 A.2d 1118 (2006).  We granted
certiorari and shall affirm.
DISCUSSION
The relevant laws relating to venue – where an action may be brought – are set
forth in CJP §§ 6-201 through 6-203.3  Section 6-201 states the general rules that (1)
“[s]ubject to the provisions of §§ 6-202 and 6-203” and “unless otherwise provided by
law, a civil action shall be brought in a county where the defendant resides, carries on a
regular business, is employed, or habitually engages in a vocation,” (2) a corporation may
also be sued where it maintains its principal offices in the State, and (3) if there is more
than one defendant and there is no single venue applicable to all defendants, all may be
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sued in any county in which any of them could be sued or in the county where the cause
of action arose.
Section 6-202 provides some alternative venues in thirteen enumerated situations,
only three of which are cited by Piven and the Chaplinskis and bear any mention.  Section
6-202(3) permits an action against a corporation which has no principal place of business
in the State to be filed in the county where the plaintiff resides; § 6-202(7) permits an
action for possession of real property to be filed in a county where a portion of the land
upon which the action is based is located; and § 6-202(13) provides that in a local action
in which the defendant cannot be found in the county where the subject matter of the
action is located, suit may be brought in any county in which venue is proper under § 6-
201. 
Section 6-203 sets forth certain exceptions to the general rule stated in § 6-201. 
Section 6-203(b)(1)(iv) provides, in relevant part, that venue in an action of trespass to
land is in the county where all or any portion of “the subject matter of the action” is
located.  Section 6-203(b)(2) adds that, if the property lies in more than one county, “the
court in which proceedings are first brought has jurisdiction over the entire property.”  In
an action for trespass to land, the “subject matter of the action” is the trespass – the
intrusion upon the land and the interference with the plaintiff’s alleged right of possession
and use of the land – and that necessarily is where the land itself is situated.  Under § 6-
203, therefore, an action for trespass to land must be brought in the county where all or
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any portion of the land is located, and it may not be brought anywhere else.
In an effort to escape the clear meaning and intent of § 6-203(b), Piven and the
Chaplinskis make essentially two arguments.  First, relying largely on Roessner v.
Mitchell, 122 Md. 460, 89 A. 722 (1914), they treat their unconnected properties (and the
unconnected properties of all of the other putative class members) not as the separate
“subject matter” of a separate trespass to those individual properties but rather as though
each of those parcels comprise but a part of a larger, aggregate “subject matter of the
 action” that relates to the alleged trespasses to all of the properties.  Their point, in this
regard, is that the Chaplinskis’ property in Baltimore City is merely a portion of a whole
that comprises both the Chaplinski and the Piven properties (and the properties of all
other putative class members), and that the action could therefore lie in any county in
which any of the properties (portions of the whole) are located, either under § 6-203(b) or
under §§ 6-201 or 6-202(3), (7), or (13).  
The second argument is that, even if the Chaplinskis’ action for trespass under
Count I of the amended complaint cannot be brought in Baltimore County, Counts II and
III constitute transitory, rather than local, actions and may be brought in any county,
including Baltimore County, in which any of the multiple defendants could be sued.
Neither argument has any merit.
Maryland has long recognized a distinction between local actions, which must be
brought where the subject matter of the action is located, and transitory actions, which
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ordinarily may be brought wherever the defendant works, lives, or has a principal office. 
The Court first explained the derivation and purpose of the distinction in Crook v.
Pitcher, 61 Md. 510, 513 (1884) and recounted that explanation and provided a broader
history in Kane v. Schulmeyer, 349 Md. 424, 708 A.2d 1038 (1998).  As we observed in
Kane, the venue doctrine “has an ancient lineage, one that originally was tied to the early,
and long-since discarded, role of jurors as knowledgeable witnesses rather than as
impartial determiners of fact based on evidence heard in court.”  Id. at 430, 708 A.2d at
1041.  It was important, in that earlier time, for plaintiffs to state with precision not just
the county but also the particular district or “hundred” within which the cause of action
arose, in order that the sheriff might summon as jurors persons who were presumed to be
acquainted with the nature of the transaction they were chosen to try.  
That requirement, tying venue to the immediate neighborhood where the cause of
action arose, continued into the Seventeenth Century in England, but was eventually
found inconvenient, especially in transactions that might happen partly in one place and
partly in another; “hence,” the Crook v. Pitcher Court noted, “arose the distinction
between local and transitory actions.”  61 Md. at 513.  The Court explained:
“If the cause of action could only have arisen in a particular
place, the action is local, and the suit must be brought in the
county or place in which it arose.  Actions for damages to real
property, actions on the case for nuisances, or for the
obstruction of one’s right of way, are according to all the
authorities local.
On the other hand, actions for injuries to the person, or to
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personal property, actions on contracts, and in fact all actions
founded on transactions, which might have taken place
anywhere, are transitory.”
Id. (citation omitted).
There has been little change over the years to the requirement that a local action be
brought where the cause of action arose.  Most of the changes in the venue rules have
come by statute and have concerned where transitory actions may be brought.  See Kane,
supra, 349 Md. at 432-34, 708 A.2d at 1042-44.  The problem, as the Court observed in
Gunther v. Dranbauer, 86 Md. 1, 6 (1897), was not so much with the elementary
principles that local actions must be brought where the cause of action arose while
transitory actions may be commenced wherever the defendant works or resides, but rather
with the application of those principles, in particular the failure of the law “to clearly
distinguish between what are local and what [are] transitory actions.”  
The Legislature attempted to bring greater clarity to the then-existing hodgepodge
of statutes when, in the inaugural debut of modern Code Revision, it enacted CJP §§ 6-
201 - 6-203 in 1973.  Unlike with the normal Code Revision process, a number of
substantive changes were made when those statutes were enacted, mostly with respect to
where transitory actions may be brought.  See Kane v. Schulmeyer, supra, 349 Md. at 435,
708 A.2d at 1044.  No change was made, however, in the law requiring that local actions
be brought in the county where the subject matter of the action is located or in the
principle that actions for trespass to land are local actions that must be brought where all
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or a portion of the land is situated.  Section 6-203(b)(1)(iv) cannot be read in any other
manner.
Piven and the Chaplinskis rely on Roessner v. Mitchell, supra, 122 Md. 460, 89 A.
722, for the undergirding proposition that their non-contiguous properties may be
considered as constituent portions of an entity comprising both properties, such that a
portion of the whole lies in both Baltimore City and Baltimore County and thereby
provides venue in either place.  As Judge Rodowsky pointed out for the Court of Special
Appeals, however, Roessner is distinguishable in several respects.      
The Roessner case arose from a partition sale.  Frederick Mitchell, a resident of
Baltimore County, owned an undivided half interest in two parcels of real property, one in
Baltimore County and one in Washington County.  With some complications that were
eventually resolved and are not relevant here, Mitchell’s interest in those properties was
devised under his Will to his children.  The Will was probated in Baltimore County. 
Because the properties could not be physically divided without loss, the children, all of
whom were residents of Baltimore County, petitioned the Circuit Court for Baltimore
County to sell the properties in lieu of partition.  Without objection, the court entered a
decree in August, 1906 directing the sale.  For whatever reason, there was a significant
delay in the sale of the Washington County property, which was sold in March, 1913 to
Roessner.  The sale price was $5,000; Roessner made a $300 deposit and agreed to pay
the $4,700 balance upon ratification.  The sale was ratified in due course, but Roessner
4 Section 87 provided, in relevant part, that whenever lands lay partly in one county
and partly in another, or whenever, in equity proceedings, some defendants resided in one
county and some in another, “that court shall have jurisdiction in which proceedings shall
have been first commenced” and that, in partition and certain other enumerated
proceedings, the action “shall be instituted” in the court of the county where the lands lay
or, if the lands were partly in one county and partly in another, in either county.  The
statute further required that, where a court decree ordered the sale of land lying only
partly in that county, a certified copy of the complaint, decree, and report of sale be filed
in the court where any other part of the land was situated.  Upon receipt of those
documents, the clerk was to docket and index the complaint and other proceedings “and
record the same as though said cause had originated in his court.”  That apparently was
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refused to pay the balance. 
Upon Roessner’s default, the sellers sought an order requiring Roessner to comply
with the terms of sale and, upon his failure to do so, to direct that the property be resold at
his risk.  Roessner replied that the court was without jurisdiction to decree the sale of the
Washington County property in the first instance because it was unconnected with the
Baltimore County property and because none of the parties to the partition proceeding
were residents of Washington County.  The Circuit Court found no merit in that defense
and ordered the property resold at Roessner’s risk.  Roessner appealed, raising the same
argument made in the Circuit Court – that the Baltimore County court was without
jurisdiction to order the sale of property in Washington County.  He urged that the
predecessor statute to CJP § 6-203(b)(2) – Maryland Code (1911) Art. 16, § 87, which
provided that where lands lie partly in one county and partly in another, proceedings may
be commenced in either county and the court in which proceedings are first commenced
has jurisdiction – did not apply where the lands in different counties were not connected.4
done in Roessner; certified copies were filed with the Circuit Court for Washington
County.
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This Court declined to construe the statute as applying only in cases where lands
situated in different counties are contiguous and form one tract.  The statute, the Court
said, was designed to avoid a multiplicity of suits and the costs attendant thereto.  In that
vein, the Court construed the statute as meaning that, if the lands to be affected by the suit
are in different counties, proceedings could be commenced where any of the land is
situated, “and the Court in which the proceedings shall have first commenced shall have
jurisdiction as to all of said land without regard to the fact that such lands are contiguous
and form one tract or parcel of land.”  Id. at 463-64, 89 A. at 723.
As noted by Judge Rodowsky, the issue in Roessner was not venue, but
jurisdiction, and that is significant.  Roessner was collaterally attacking the jurisdiction of
the Baltimore County court to order the partition sale of property in Washington County. 
He was not a party to that proceeding, however, and the decree he attacked was a final
judgment that had been entered, by consent of the parties, seven years earlier.  Although
the two parcels, lying in different counties, were not contiguous, they had been under the
common ownership of the parties’ predecessor in title, and remained under common
ownership by virtue of the predecessor’s Will that had been probated in Baltimore
County.  The interests of all of the parties to the partition action were identical, and all of
the parties were resident in Baltimore County.  There was a sufficient connection between
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the Circuit Court for Baltimore County and the interests that the parties before it had in
the Washington County property to afford jurisdiction under the statute.
Finally, as we have observed, the statute construed in Roessner specifically
required that certified copies of the complaint, decree, and report of sale be filed with the
clerk of the court in each county where a portion of the land was situate and that the clerk
of that court docket and record those documents “the same as though said cause had
originated in his court.”  The statute thus tended to treat the proceeding as though it had
commenced as well in each county where the land was located.  In that light, it is not
surprising that the Court, responding to a jurisdictional challenge, gave an expansive
meaning to the statute, to avoid, as it said at 122 Md. 464, 89 A. at 723, “a multiplicity of
suits and the costs and expenses of such suits.” 
That is not the case here.  Those requirements contained in the 1911 statute
construed in Roessner are not found in §§ 6-202 or 6-203.  That omission, coupled with
the comprehensive revision of the venue laws in 1973, militates against such an expansive
reading of §§ 6-202 and 6-203.  The Legislature clearly intended that an action for
trespass to a separate parcel of land be brought in the county where all or some part of
that parcel is located.
This distinction, which lies at the heart of the distinction between local and
transitory actions, precludes Piven and the Chaplinskis from aggregating their separate
properties, located in different counties, into a greater whole and regarding them as
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merely a portion of that whole, and that, in turn, destroys any pretense of venue in
Baltimore County with respect to the Chaplinski property under CJP § 6-202 or § 6-
203(b)(2).  As to § 6-202(3), even if the Comcast defendants that allegedly committed a
trespass on the Chaplinski property have no principal place of business in Maryland, the
proper venue would still be Baltimore City, where the Chaplinskis reside.  That is true as
well with § 6-202(7); to the extent the action could in any way be construed as one to
recover possession of real property, it could be brought only where a portion of the land is
located, and, as to the Chaplinskis, that is in Baltimore City.  Section 6-202(13) has no
application, as there has been no allegation that the Comcast defendants “cannot be
found” in Baltimore City.  An assertion of venue under § 6-203(b)(2) fails because no
portion of the Chaplinski property lies in Baltimore County.
Finally, Piven and the Chaplinskis urge that, even if the Chaplinskis are precluded
from pursuing their trespass action in Baltimore County, they are not precluded from
pursuing Counts II and III of their amended complaint, for unjust enrichment and to quiet
title, in that county, those being, in their view, transitory actions.  We disagree.  As Judge
Rodowsky observed for the Court of Special Appeals, courts must ordinarily look beyond
labels and conclusory averments and make determinations based on the substance of the
allegations of a pleading.  Counts II and III of the amended complaint are founded solely
on an alleged trespass, and they seek precisely the same relief prayed in Count I.  They
stand no differently, for venue purposes, than Count I.
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Ordinarily, the appropriate remedy in a case of this kind would be to transfer the
actions by the Chaplinskis to the Circuit Court for Baltimore City pursuant to Maryland
Rule 2-327(b) and permit the Piven action to proceed in Baltimore County.  That option
was offered to the plaintiffs in connection with the initial complaint, and they rejected it. 
The ability to transfer, rather than dismiss, an action based on a finding of improper
venue is discretionary, and in light of the plaintiffs’ refusal to avail themselves of that
option, and their insistence that the action include the Chaplinskis’ claim, we find no
abuse of discretion in the court dismissing the amended complaint.
JUDGMENT OF COURT OF SPECIAL APPEALS
AFFIRMED, WITH COSTS.