Court Opinion

ID: 9576257
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:22:21.919686+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:03:35.129023
License: Public Domain

HENRIOD, Justice
(dissenting).
I dissent. The facts related in the main opinion all spring from highly self-serving testimony of the plaintiffs, and all the substantial facts therein recited were categorically denied. All of those facts are quite incompatible with undeniable physical facts irrefutably pointing to an absence of mutual mistake that would justify the reformation of an instrument of title, properly acknowledged, presumably examined and recorded by the people who now attempt to attack it on grounds such mistake was established by clear and convincing evidence. Furthermore, what appears to be significant evidence is either minimized by or left out of the main opinion. As opposed to what I believe are weak facts reported, there are unassailable circumstances that destroy any conclusion that a mutual mistake was shown by clear and convincing evidence.
In 1951, a real estate contract was executed by the parties, clearly describing the property by metes and bounds as commencing in the center of the street. The seller, Mrs. Beckstead, never met the Jankes until the execution thereof. Plaintiffs agreed to assume a mortgage which also described the property as commencing in the middle of the street, as did an attorney’s title opinion given incident to the assumption of the mortgage. ’A warranty deed conveying title to plaintiffs also clearly described the property as “Commencing at a point in the center of a county road” was executed and recorded. All of these clear, unequivocal descriptions are ignored by the trial court and the main opinion, apparently on the unsubstantial basis that the testimony of the plaintiffs (both of them) was to the effect that they had not read the documents. In the past this court has not accepted any *253such explanation.1 It seems inconceivable that the defendant sellers either had not read these descriptions or that by any stretch of the imagination mistakenly could have believed that “Commencing in the middle of a county road” meant “Commencing on the East line of a county road”; and it is elementary, of course, that the kind of mistake that will justify reformation if established by clear and convincing evidence, must be a mutual, not a unilateral mistake.
Another significant fact negating any mutual mistake or intention to convey more property than described is that, as the property was described, the seller here had 75 feet of property remaining, suitable for a building lot, whereas, after reformation by the court, she had but 42 feet, which common knowledge tells us would be worthless as a building lot or for most anything else, for that matter. The very fact of reformation which reduces the remaining area to a 42-foot strip, is significant in disproving any intent to convey more property than that described in the documents of title, all of which plaintiffs had a duty to examine carefully.
Also it is significant that the mortgage loan company obviously was not apprised of any intention to convey more property than clearly described, nor was the title examining attorney aware of any such intention; and it is almost inconceivable that such company would have permitted the execution and recordation of the warranty deed had it been aware of the fact that the parties had some other property in mind.
In October, 19S3, defendants in writing notified plaintiffs of their- incursion onto the former’s property. In May, 1954, they renewed this notice in writing, demanding $25 per month rental for the use of the disputed property or removal therefrom. In March, 1955, they had their counsel notify plaintiffs in writing of their insistence on the rental or removal.
The above facts are mostly physical and hence unassailable, pointing to an absence of any intention to sell more land than that clearly described in the documents of title. On the other hand, most of the facts related in the main opinion originate in the self-serving testimony of the plaintiffs themselves, and are unsupported by any uncontroverted facts, — certainly no undeniable physical facts.
The main opinion makes a point that defendants saw the dog run which plaintiffs built. True: But the undisputed fact is. that having seen it they notified plaintiffs in October, 1953, of such intrusion, and later insisted on rental or removal. The opinion (relating the testimony of plain*254tiffs), states that an uncle of defendants brought a plat to plaintiffs showing the starting point to be at a place on the side of the street, all of which the uncle denied. The opinion asserts that neither the real estate contract nor the warranty deed that followed it mentioned any right of way over the West 33 feet of the property. This statement is not accurate. A description calling for a commencement point in the middle of a public street is tantamount to a description calling for an easement in the public over the area between the middle of the street and the side of the street. The opinion says it is significant that the title documents (which plaintiffs claim they did not read) remained in the possession of the mortgagee. This does not seem significant at all, but presupposes that plaintiffs were precluded from seeing them, an assumption unsupported in the record, and ignores the obligation of signatories to contracts to read the instruments they sign. The opinion goes on to say it is significant that the description in the documents covers a lesser tract than was sold. This is an amazing non sequitur, assuming the whole case, begging the question and ignoring the unassailable facts mentioned. Further, the opinion says that the respondents testified they became uneasy about the description on receiving the 1952 tax notice which bore the same description as the other documents; that they contacted defendants who assured them the matter would be straightened out, all of which was denied. It is significant therefore, that after such contact in 1952, the defendants in October, 1953, notified plaintiffs to get off the property, notified them again in May, 1954, and again in March, 1955, the while the plaintiffs did nothing about this lawsuit until 1956. The opinion states that one of the defendants (according to plaintiff’s testimony) came to the property early in 1953 and assured the plaintiffs that the property was that claimed by them and not by a description starting in the middle of the street. This was denied. Denied or not, it is quite inconsistent with the undisputed physical facts that plaintiffs were ordered off the property in the same year, 1953, again in 1954, and again in 1955, while the plaintiffs waited until 1956 to assert their claimed, but highly questionable rights.
The evidence is clear and convincing in reverse in this case, the irrefutable facts pointing to an intention to convey only that which was clearly described and to a complete failure to sustain the burden of proving a mutual mistake by clear and convincing evidence. To say there is clear and convincing evidence to support the decision here, in my opinion, is to attach to that phrase a connotation that is unusual and traditionally unsupported by authority.
, The case should be reversed. (Emphasis added.)

. Garff Realty Co. v. Better Buildings, 1951, 120 Utah 344, 234 P.2d 842; Ephraim Theatre Co. v. Hawk, 1958, 7 Utah 2d 163, 321 P.2d 221; Jensen’s Used Cars v. Rice, 1958, 7 Utah 2d 276, 323 P.2d 259.