In 1994 defendants Shirley and Ray Wolf, who had inherited lot 14 from Shirley's mother, divided the lot into three parcels. They sold the northernmost parcel, on which their house was located, and entered into an agreement with defendant DeMarco to build a house on the southernmost parcel, adjacent to the alley. During that construction, defendants erected a high wooden fence at the southern edge of their property, blocking plaintiff's path across the rear of lot 14. Plaintiff sued, claiming an easement by prescription. The trial court ruled that plaintiff had established an easement twelve feet wide across the southern portion of lot 14.
Defendants raise five assignments of error on appeal.
We reject their second and fourth assignments, which relate to the openness of plaintiff's use and the width of the easement, without discussion. Their first assignment of error concerns the continuity of plaintiff's use of the path across lot 14. Defendants argue that the trial court erred in considering use by plaintiff's contractors and guests in determining whether plaintiff's use was continuous. In other words, defendants assert that plaintiff and her husband's personal use of the roadway was insufficient to meet the requirement of continuous use, that the trial court made up for that deficiency by crediting to plaintiff use by her contractors and guests, and that the court erred in so doing because the acts of third parties cannot be credited to plaintiff for that purpose. We need not reach defendants' argument concerning use by third parties, because it is clear on this record that the use of the roadway by plaintiff and her husband, by itself, was sufficiently continuous to satisfy the requirement for a prescriptive easement.