Suedkamp v. Taylor, ED 106911

• Decision Date: 16 July 2019
• Docket Number: No. ED 106911,ED 106911
• Citation: 578 S.W.3d 408
• Parties: William C. SUEDKAMP and Persimmon Ridge Vineyards, LLC, Appellants, v. Darrel TAYLOR, Mint Properties, LLC, and Elijah McArdle, Respondents, and Lisa Taylor, Respondent/Cross-Appellant, and John Doe and Jane Doe, Defendants.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

578 S.W.3d 408

William C. SUEDKAMP and Persimmon Ridge Vineyards, LLC, Appellants,

v. Darrel TAYLOR, Mint Properties, LLC, and Elijah McArdle, Respondents,andLisa Taylor, Respondent/Cross-Appellant,andJohn Doe and Jane Doe, Defendants.

No. ED 106911

Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District, DIVISION THREE.

Filed: July 16, 2019

FOR APPELLANTS, James M. Kreitler, Megan E. Tongue, 455 Maple Street, P.O. Box 740, Hillsboro, Missouri 63050.

FOR RESPONDENTS, Mint Properites, Pro Se, Elijah Mcardle, Pro Se, Darrel Taylor, Pro Se.

James M. Dowd, Judge

1. Introduction.

This dispute concerns the nature and scope of two roadway easements that were created long before the parties here came into possession of the two adjacent parcels in question. In 1982, Paul Ellis, the original owner of all the property before us, subdivided it, retained the first parcel for himself, sold the second parcel, and created two roadway easements that passed from his parcel over the second parcel to two public roadways on the other side.

Appellant Suedkamp became owner of the first parcel in 2010 and he owned and operated the Persimmon Ridge Vineyards winery on that property. Respondent/cross-appellant Lisa Taylor acquired the second parcel over which the easements passed and her now-ex-husband Darrel Taylor occupied the property with her. After Appellants brought this suit for damages arising out of the alleged interference by the Taylors with their use of the easements, the following summary judgment motions were filed and heard and the trial court ruled as follows:

1. The trial court granted in part Appellants' motion for summary judgment finding that the easements were valid and enforceable appurtenant easements, the court enjoined the Taylors from any further interference with Appellants' use of the easements, but the court denied the remainder of the motion which had sought to establish the scope and permissible use of the easements and that Appellants were damaged by the Taylors' conduct with respect to the easements. As a result, those issues remained for trial.

2. The trial court granted Darrel Taylor’s motion for summary judgment finding that because defendants did not have notice of the easements, Appellants were not entitled to any damages as a result of the alleged interference with and damage to the easements.

3. The trial court denied Lisa Taylor’s motion for summary judgment.

Now, Appellants seek review of the trial court’s partial summary judgment that Appellants were not entitled to damages based on the court’s reasoning that Appellants' failure to demonstrate that defendants had notice of the easements precluded any award of damages.

Lisa Taylor cross-appeals, alleging that (1) the court erred by not staying the proceedings because she had filed for bankruptcy; (2) that the court, in granting Appellants' partial summary judgment, improperly found the existence of two appurtenant easements; and (3) that the court erred in ruling against her, following a bench trial, on each of her counterclaims for common law trespass, abuse of process, and private nuisance.

We reverse the trial court’s entry of partial summary judgment to the extent it found that the Taylors did not have notice of the easements and as a result Appellants were not entitled to obtain damages due to the Taylors' alleged obstruction of and interference with the easements. We affirm the remainder of the trial court’s judgment.

2. Background regarding the property and easements in question.

The two parcels involved here were created in 1982 by Paul Ellis when he subdivided his larger plot into the two parcels before us, retained one of the parcels, and sold the other. In connection with that subdivision and sale, Ellis created two roadway easements over the parcel he sold to allow passage from his property, over the adjoining parcel, to two public roadways on the other side. These easements were described in the general warranty deed employed in connection with the sale of the second parcel and they were properly recorded.

The parcel Ellis retained was transferred various times within the Ellis family with Mary Clark, Paul Ellis' daughter, being the last Ellis family member to own it. None of those transfers specifically mentions the easements. While she owned the property, Mary Clark and her husband used and maintained the two easements and at some time before she sold the property to Appellant Suedkamp, Mary Clark built and operated the Vineyards winery on the property. In September 2010, Appellant Suedkamp acquired the property from Clark "together with all rights and appurtenances."

The second parcel was also transferred several times by general warranty deed including the transfer to Lisa Taylor, but the easements were not identified or described on any of those deeds either. The last two transfers involve parties before us as Lisa Taylor obtained title on March 25, 2016, from Mint Property, LLC,¹ which had just acquired the property on September 30, 2015.

3. The dispute.

When Appellant Suedkamp acquired the property, he also acquired the Vineyards winery. The Vineyards included a tasting room open to the public, which occasionally presented live music for up to 80 customers at a time. Customers and staff sometimes used the easements for ingress and egress.

Then in September or October 2015, when Lisa Taylor took possession of the second parcel, she immediately began disputing with Suedkamp regarding the existence and scope of the easements. For his part, Suedkamp complained that the Taylors were interfering with his use of the easements with physical obstructions and the removal through the use of heavy machinery of culverts and gravel that had been laid down on the easements.

Appellants filed the instant suit in December 2015. Appellants sought injunctive relief, damages for common law trespass and statutory trespass pursuant to § 537.340,² and damages for the maintenance of the roadway. Lisa Taylor’s counterclaim alleged common law trespass, abuse of process, private nuisance, quiet title, and adverse possession.

Prior to the entry of the court’s summary judgment order, Lisa Taylor filed for bankruptcy, which resulted in a stay of the proceedings. Though the stay was partially lifted on January 16, 2018, the bankruptcy court’s order stated that "[n]o judgment for money damages may be granted."

Then, Taylor voluntarily dismissed her quiet title and adverse possession claims and the matter went to trial in April 2018 on her claims for common law trespass, abuse of process, and private nuisance. Following a bench trial, the court ruled against Taylor on all claims finding them either without merit or moot in light of the court’s partial summary judgment. The present appeal follows.

Standard of Review

Appellants' sole point and the first two points of Taylor’s cross-appeal relate to the court’s partial summary judgment and therefore our review of those points is essentially de novo. ITT Commercial Fin. Corp. v. Mid-Am. Marine Supply Corp. , 854 S.W.2d 371, 376 (Mo. banc 1993). This Court is limited to the record that was before the trial court in reaching its decision; our review does not extend to the entire record. Earth City Crescent Assoc., L.P. v. LAGF Assoc.-Mo, L.L.C. , 60 S.W.3d 44, 46 (Mo.App.E.D. 2001). The interpretation of a deed is a question of law that we review de novo. Erwin v. City of Palmyra , 119 S.W.3d 582, 584 (Mo.App.E.D. 2003). We review the record in the light most favorable to the party against whom judgment was entered. Earth City Crescent Assoc., L.P. , 60 S.W.3d at 46.

The remainder of Taylor’s points on cross-appeal address the trial court’s judgment following the bench trial and those points invoke our standard of review of court-tried cases. On appeal of a court-tried case, we will sustain the judgment of the trial court unless there is no substantial evidence to support it, it is against the weight of the evidence, it erroneously declares the law, or it erroneously applies the law. Murphy v. Carron , 536 S.W.2d 30, 32 (Mo.banc 1976), We defer to the trial court on factual matters, and "all issues of fact on which the court has not made a specific finding are considered as having been found in accordance with the result reached." Hinshaw v. M-C-M Properties, LLC, 450 S.W.3d 823, 826 (Mo.App.W.D. 2014).

Discussion

1. Appellants' sole point on appeal.

In their sole point on appeal, Appellants assert the trial court erred in its partial summary judgment when it found that even though the easements were valid and enforceable, Appellants were not entitled to damages because the court found that Appellants' burden included showing that the Taylors had notice of the easements and the Taylors established as a matter of undisputed fact that they did not have notice of the easements. We hold that the trial court erred in this regard.

An easement is a non-possessory interest in the real estate of another that confers a right of one person to use the property for a general or specific purpose. Burg v. Dampier , 346 S.W.3d 343, 353 (Mo.App.W.D. 2011). Though the right conferred by an easement is not a possessory right, it is nonetheless a right that can be enforced at law or in equity. Id.

"Easements are either ‘appurtenant’ or ‘in gross.’ " Id. An appurtenant easement creates a dominant tenement, which is the land benefited by the easement, and a servient tenement, the land burdened, and the easement runs with both parcels. Three-O-Three Investments, Inc. v. Moffitt , 622 S.W.2d 736, 739 (Mo.App.W.D. 1981). "Two of the principal legal attributes of an easement appurtenant for right of way purposes are the existence of both a dominant and servient tenement and that one terminus of the right of way must lie on the land to which it is claimed to be appurtenant." Phelan v. Rosener , 511 S.W.3d 431, 438 (Mo.App.E.D. 2017) (internal quotation marks omitted). "Words of limitation such as ‘heirs’ or ‘assigns’ of the grantee are not required to create an easement...