Hollis v. Wyrosdick
| Decision Date | 05 June 1987 |
| Citation | 508 So.2d 704 |
| Parties | C.H. HOLLIS, Individually, and C.H. Hollis Timber Company, Inc. v. Rudolph WYROSDICK, et al. 85-970. |
| Court | Alabama Supreme Court |
Mark Vaughan of Cannon & Vaughan, Elba, for appellants.
Warren Rowe of Rowe, Rowe & Sawyer, Enterprise, for appellees.
This is an appeal from a jury verdict for the plaintiffs in a landowners' suit against the defendants, C.H. Hollis and the C.H. Hollis Timber Company. (The two defendants shall be referred to as "Hollis".) We affirm.
The plaintiffs, Rudolph Wyrosdick and his wife Jeanette, and Eddie Hill and his wife Judy, are coterminous landowners whose lands share a common boundary line with property owned by John N. Swartz. In September 1983, Swartz executed a timber deed to Hollis, which, for a stated consideration, conveyed to Hollis all the merchantable pine and hardwood timber on Swartz's land.
Before the timber-cutting operation began, Hollis sent a forester to survey and mark the landline; the loggers were to follow the marks, which were to prevent intrusions by the loggers onto the plaintiffs' adjacent property. The forester determined the property line to be an old barbed wire fence which ran in a true north-south direction along what he perceived as the plaintiffs' western boundary. The forester "flagged" the fence as the boundary line for the logging operation. No trees were cut beyond the fence; however, as the plaintiffs' surveyor testified, the fence was approximately 50 to 100 feet east of the actual property line as determined by survey.
Although the parties' property lines are disputed, it is undisputed that the land belonging to Swartz (identified as "Section 25" in the maps and documents at trial) does not meet the requirements for an "ordinary section," as that term is used in the legal description of land. The plaintiffs' surveyor was questioned on this point at trial:
The plaintiffs filed suit against Hollis in the summer of 1984. The original complaint requested that the trial court determine the boundary between the plaintiffs' land and Swartz's land and enjoin Hollis from asserting any rights in the plaintiffs' lands. The complaint went on to allege that Hollis had committed trespass and conversion, and that Hollis had cut and removed 575 trees from the plaintiffs' lands; Hollis was alleged to be liable to the plaintiffs for the full value of the 575 trees and for an alleged diminution in value of the plaintiffs' real estate. 1
During the second day of trial, the plaintiffs were allowed to amend their complaint for purposes of "clarification":
The jury found for the plaintiffs and returned verdict forms which read:
Hollis's post-trial motions for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict and for a new trial were denied. This appeal followed.
In support of the argument for reversal, Hollis claims that the jury arrived at the verdict amounts by using the computations set out in § 35-14-1. Therefore, says Hollis, in order to use the statute as a guide for assessing damages, the jury necessarily found that Hollis willfully and knowingly entered the plaintiffs' property and cut the plaintiffs' trees without the consent of the plaintiffs'--a conclusion which Hollis maintains is unsupported by the evidence. 3
We will assume without deciding that the evidence of record does not support a finding that Hollis willfully and knowingly, without the consent of the plaintiffs, wrongfully entered the plaintiffs' property and cut the trees thereon. We can not say, however, that the jury's verdicts are unsupported by the evidence, nor do we find the verdicts to be improper in light of the evidence. Despite our assumption of a lack of evidence of willful or knowing misconduct, there was sufficient evidence from which the jury could have concluded that Hollis's logging operation did cause a trespass onto the plaintiffs' property and a conversion of the plaintiffs' timber. Further, in its instructions to the jury, the trial court clearly explained each claim made by the plaintiffs, set out the prerequisites for finding for the plaintiffs on their claims, and explained the defenses asserted by Hollis and the prerequisites for application of the...
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...automobile or an award of punitive damages. G. M. Mosley Contractors, Inc. v. Phillips, 487 So. 2d 876, 879 (Ala. 1986); Hollis v. Wyrosdick, 508 So. 2d 704 (Ala. 1987); Campbell v. Burns, 512 So. 2d 1341, 1343 (Ala. 1987); Ashbee v. Brock, 510 So. 2d 214 (Ala. 1987); and Jawad v. Granade, ......
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