Williams v. White

• Decision Date: 22 April 2016
• Docket Number: 2140958.
• Citation: 207 So.3d 59
• Parties: Twana Jordan WILLIAMS and Tina Jo Weldon v. Wendell WHITE.
• Court: Alabama Court of Civil Appeals

207 So.3d 59

Twana Jordan WILLIAMS and Tina Jo Weldon

v.Wendell WHITE.

2140958.

Court of Civil Appeals of Alabama.

April 22, 2016.

Mark P. Williams of Norman, Wood, Kendrick, & Turner, Birmingham, for appellants.

Submitted on appellants' brief only.

THOMPSON, Presiding Judge.

Twana Jordan Williams and Tina Jo Weldon ("the sisters") appeal from a judgment of the Clarke Circuit Court ("the trial court") in this civil action involving a property dispute. In their complaint, the sisters sought to enforce the boundary lines between their property and the property of Wendell White as set forth in the deed conveying White's property to him.

Specifically, they claimed that the boundaries of White's property conformed to those depicted on a boundary survey and set forth in the legal description of the property contained in the deed conveying the property to White. The sisters asserted that a chain-link fence surrounding a portion of White's property also enclosed a portion of their property; the sisters' property enclosed within the chain-link fence is hereinafter referred to as "the disputed property." White had built or made improvements to structures contained within the fence, which the sisters claimed encroached on the disputed property. The sisters requested damages and injunctive relief against White in connection with White's alleged trespass on the disputed property. They also sought the removal of the "encroaching structures." There was no dispute that certain of the structures that lay within the chain-link fence were outside White's property. In addition, the sisters sought an injunction to enjoin White from using their property to enter and exit a separate parcel of property that White owns. The ownership and boundaries of that separate parcel are not disputed.

On April 9, 2015, the trial court entered an order in which it determined that White owned in fee simple the disputed property; in other words, the trial court determined that White owned all the property enclosed in the chain-link fence. The trial court denied the sisters' request for damages in connection with the alleged trespass, but the order made no mention of the injunctive relief they sought. Because the trial court's order did not determine the rights of the parties regarding the sisters' requests for injunctive relief against White, this court determined that there was no final judgment capable of supporting an appeal. Therefore, on January 5, 2016, this court entered an order reinvesting the trial court with jurisdiction to enter a judgment addressing the sisters' claims for injunctive relief. On February 2, 2016, the trial court complied with this court's order and entered an amended judgment denying the sisters' claims for injunctive relief. Because all the claims as to all the parties have now been disposed of, we are able at this time to address the appeal on its merits.

The record indicates the following. The sisters are the daughters of Betty Lou Jordan and Joe Cecil Jordan. The Jordans owned approximately 17.6 acres of land in Coffeeville, Clarke County. The family's residence was on the land. In 1980, Joe Cecil and Betty Lou divorced. As part of the property settlement, Joe Cecil conveyed a life estate in the property, excepting a one-acre tract, to Betty Lou. Upon Betty Lou's death, the property subject to Betty Lou's life estate was to go to the sisters. The one-acre parcel was awarded to Betty Lou in fee simple. A recorded deed providing a legal description of the one-acre parcel as well as a survey map of that parcel were recorded in the Clarke County probate office on June 3, 1980.

On February 14, 1985, Betty Lou conveyed the one-acre parcel to Destry Dunagan and his wife, Carolyn. On July 28, 1986, the Dunagans conveyed the property to White, Carolyn's brother. Dennifer White, who was White's wife at the time, was included on the deed. However, when she and White divorced in 1996, Dennifer executed a quitclaim deed to White for her interest in the one-acre parcel. None of the deeds conveying the one-acre parcel of property mentioned a chain-link fence or a fence line; they did, however, include a legal description of a square acre of property. White testified that Betty Lou put up the chain-link fence enclosing the disputed property and a portion of the one- acre parcel before she sold the one-acre parcel to the Dunagans.

On June 23, 1986, approximately a month before he purchased the one-acre parcel from the Dunagans, White entered into a "ten-year lease" with Betty Lou for property adjacent to the one-acre parcel; the leased property included the disputed property. The lease ran from June 23, 1986, through December 31, 1996, and gave White the option to extend the lease for an additional ten years. Lease payments were due once a year, by the last day of January. Betty Lou died in March 2011. Williams testified that Betty Lou had told her that White had paid rent for the leased property until "probably" the year before Betty Lou died. Williams also stated that White had paid rent through "'09 or '10, something like that." White agreed that, although he had not signed a second lease or a document formally extending the original lease term, he continued to pay Betty Lou to lease the property. He testified that he did not believe he paid rent after 2003.

The lease gave White, as the lessee, "all rights to use said land as if it is [his] to use and enjoy said land as it is [his] so long as [he] do[es] not damage the property." A second provision of the lease stated:

"At the termination of this lease, the lessee shall surrender the premises with all buildings erected thereon and additions thereto, and all landlord's fixtures affixed thereto within the last ten years of the said term in such repair and condition as shall be in accordance with the covenants herein contained."

Nothing in the lease, a copy of which is included in the record on appeal, precluded White from building on the leased property. White testified that he was aware that, when the lease ended, any structure he had put on the leased property would revert to the property owner. He also conceded that, even after he stopped paying rent in 2003, he continued to use the property adjacent to his one-acre parcel—i.e., the leased property—pursuant to the terms of the lease. When asked whether he was requesting that the trial court find that he owned everything inside the chain-link fence, White replied: "I would love to, I mean—" It is unclear from the record whether White's attorney interrupted him with a new question or whether White simply trailed off, but his attorney then asked him if he had been using that property for "twenty-something years."

Even after he stopped paying Betty Lou, White said, he used the leased property as an area to park his log trailers, and, he said, Betty Lou never complained. He also testified that, with Betty Lou's consent, he planted an "oat patch" on the leased property. White also testified that, in approximately 1994, Betty Lou had timber cut from the leased property.

As mentioned, the trial court entered an order on April 9, 2015. In that order the trial court found that White and his predecessors "have been in open, notorious, exclusive, and hostile possession" of the disputed property lying within the chain-link fence for more than 20 years, and it awarded White fee-simple title to all the property within the fence. The sisters were awarded an easement along the roadway that ran from Highway 69 through White's property to their adjacent property. In the final judgment entered on February 2, 2016, the trial court denied the sisters' requests for injunctive relief. The sisters appealed to the Alabama Supreme Court, which transferred the appeal to this court pursuant to § 12–2–7(6), Ala.Code 1975.

On appeal, the sisters contend that the trial court erred in finding that White owned the disputed property—i.e., the property beyond the one-acre parcel he had purchased but within the chain-link fence—through adverse possession; in other words, the sisters contend that the trial court erred in determining that White had been in open, notorious, exclusive, and hostile possession of the disputed property for more than 20 years. White did not favor this court with a brief on appeal.

"Where a trial court hears ore tenus testimony, as in this case, its findings based upon that testimony are presumed correct, and its judgment based on those findings will be reversed only if, after a consideration of all the evidence and after making all inferences that can logically be drawn from the evidence, the judgment is found to be plainly and palpably erroneous. See City of Birmingham v. Sansing Sales of Birmingham, Inc., 547 So.2d 464 (Ala.1989) ; King v. Travelers Ins. Co., 513 So.2d 1023 (Ala.198[7]) ; Robinson v. Hamilton, 496 So.2d 8 (Ala.1986) ; see, also, Meeks v. Hill, 557 So.2d 1238 (Ala.1990). The trial court's judgment will be affirmed if there is credible evidence to support the judgment. City of Birmingham v. Sansing Sales of Birmingham, Inc., supra; see, also, American Casualty Co. v. Wright, 554 So.2d 1015 (Ala.1989).... The presumption of correctness is particularly strong in boundary line disputes and adverse possession cases, because the evidence in such cases is difficult for an appellate court to review. Seidler v. Phillips, 496 So.2d 714 (Ala.1986) ; Wallace v. Putman, 495 So.2d 1072 (Ala.1986) ; Drennen Land & Timber Co. v. Angell, 475 So.2d 1166 (Ala.1985) ; May v. Campbell, 470 So.2d 1188 (Ala.1985)."

Bearden v. Ellison, 560 So.2d 1042, 1043–44 (Ala.1990). Questions of law are reviewed de novo. Alabama Republican Party v. McGinley, 893 So.2d 337, 342 (Ala.2004).

Based on the language used in the judgment, the trial court appears to have treated this case as one involving adverse possession by prescription and not as one involving a boundary-line dispute between coterminous landowners.¹

"In Kerlin v. Tensaw Land & Timber Co., 390 So.2d 616 (Ala.

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