LeCompte v. Lueders

• Decision Date: 04 March 1892
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: LE COMPTE v. LUEDERS.

51 N.W. 542

90 Mich. 495

LE COMPTE v. LUEDERS.

Supreme Court of Michigan

March 4, 1892

Error to circuit court, Muskegon county; ALBERT DICKERMAN, Judge.

This was an action of trespass by Thomas Le Compte against Henry Lueders. From a judgment for defendant, plaintiff appeals. Reversed.

J E. Sullivan, for appellant.

De Long & O'Hara, for appellee.

LONG J.

This action of trespass was commenced in justice court, where plea of title was interposed, and cause certified to the circuit. Upon trial there, defendant had verdict and judgment. The parties are the owners of adjoining lots of land in McGraft & Montgomery's addition to the village of Lakeside, now a part of the city of Muskegon. Plaintiff owns and is in possession of lot 2, block 5, and the defendant owns and is in possession of lot 1 of the same block. The two lots adjoin, and the action grows out of a dispute as to the true boundary line between the lots. Block 5, with other property, was platted by McGraft & Montgomery as an addition to the village of Lakeside in the year 1879. Mr. John B. Smalley made the surveys from which the plat was made, and drove cedar stakes at that time, indicating the corners of the lots. During the fall of 1879, Charles H. De Puy-then in the employ of McGraft & Montgomery-built a fence according to stakes then standing, indicating they had been placed by a surveyor, inclosing all of said block excepting the two lots in controversy. The next spring, lot 1 was purchased by a Mr. Ault from McGraft & Montgomery, and it is from him that the defendant claims title to that lot by mesne conveyances. After Ault purchased, Mr. De Puy, who was still in the employ of McGraft & Montgomery, built a line fence between the lots 1 and 2. This fence was partly destroyed by fire upon two different occasions, but built again upon the same line, the posts being put in the same place as the partly burned posts. The last fence was built of upright boards the whole length of the line between the two lots, but on the same line occupied by the first fence built there. This fence was standing at the time defendant, Lueders, purchased lot 1. The plaintiff purchased lot 2 in January, 1890, with this high board fence still standing as the boundary between the two lots. Plaintiff went into possession under his deed, and while so occupying lot 2, defendant, Lueders, who was making some repairs to a building on his lot, ordered his carpenters to remove this fence between the lots, which they did about three feet westward upon plaintiff's lot,...