Title: Fletcher v. Ferry

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

Fletcher v. Ferry (2005-295)

2007 VT 8

[Filed 02-Feb-2007]


       NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under
  V.R.A.P. 40 as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont
  Reports.  Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions,
  Vermont Supreme Court, 109 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05609-0801 of
  any errors in order that corrections may be made before this opinion goes
  to press.


                                  2007 VT 8

                                No. 2005-295


  Howard Fletcher                                Supreme Court

                                                 On Appeal from
       v.                                        Washington Superior Court


  Henry W. Ferry                                 September Term, 2006


  Mary Miles Teachout, J.

  Edward M. Kenney of Roesler, Whittlesey, Meekins & Amidon, Burlington, for 
    Plaintiff-Appellee.

  Paul S. Gillies of Tarrant, Marks & Gillies, Montpelier, for
    Defendant-Appellant.


  PRESENT:  Reiber, C.J., Johnson, Skoglund and Burgess, JJ., and 
            Crawford, Supr. J.,  Specially Assigned

        
       ¶  1.  JOHNSON, J.   The case before us arose out of a dispute over
  a right-of-way that defendant Ferry claims over plaintiff Fletcher's
  property.  Both parties are unhappy with the trial court's decision. 
  Defendant appeals the location of the right-of-way, as found by the court,
  and plaintiff cross-appeals, contending the right-of-way was extinguished
  by merger.  We agree with plaintiff that the trial court erred in failing
  to find that common ownership in the chain of title eliminated the
  right-of-way, despite the common owner's acquisition of one of the parcels
  by intestate succession, and his failure to probate the estates of his
  parents.  We therefore reverse.  In view of our holding, it is unnecessary
  to reach the issues raised by defendant's appeal. (FN1)
          
       ¶  2.  The dispute between the present owners began in June 2000, when
  defendant wrote a letter to plaintiff advising that he planned to use a
  right-of-way conveyed for the benefit of his land, known as the Scribner
  woodlot, across plaintiff's land, the Fletcher parcel.  Plaintiff refused
  to recognize the existence of a right-of-way, as it was not indicated in
  the deed to his property.  While the right-of-way described in defendant's
  deed was by that point no longer a visible path, in 2001, defendant drove a
  small tractor across the Fletcher parcel along the course that he believed
  was the route of the original easement. 
   
       ¶  3.  As a result, the dispute ripened into a lawsuit in July 2001
  when plaintiff filed a complaint in the Washington Superior Court,
  disputing defendant's right to cross his land, and seeking declaratory and
  injunctive relief and damages for trespass as well as punitive damages.  In
  count seven of his complaint, plaintiff alleged that any easement across
  his property was extinguished in January 1972, when the two parcels came
  into the common ownership of Franklin Scribner, one of their predecessors
  in title.  The trial court rejected plaintiff's merger-doctrine theory and
  concluded that defendant held an easement across the Fletcher parcel for
  access to the Scribner woodlot.  In its conclusions of law, the court held
  that plaintiff failed to show that Franklin  intended to merge the parcels
  in 1972, and that intent was necessary for the merger doctrine to take
  effect.  Furthermore, the court determined that the right-of-way was not
  extinguished because the estates were not probated and therefore, given the
  possibility that there may have been creditors of the estates, Franklin
  could not be said to have acquired the full legal title necessary for
  merger to take place by operation of law.   

       ¶  4.  Plaintiff claims on appeal that the title history shows unity
  of ownership and possession in Franklin in 1972, thereby extinguishing the
  easement as a matter of law; that the trial court erred in holding that
  intent to merge parcels in common ownership is a prerequisite to merger;
  and that plaintiff's failure to prove that there were no creditors who may
  have had claims against the unprobated estates did not deprive Franklin of
  the quality of title necessary for the merger doctrine to operate.  

       ¶  5.  Under the common-law merger doctrine, an easement ceases to
  exist when the dominant and servient estates come into common ownership. 
  Capital Candy Co. v. Savard, 135 Vt. 14, 15,