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21 Cal. 453

Hutton v. Schumaker

California Supreme Court

Decided July 1, 1863

California Supreme Court · decided 1863-07-01

Ejectment to recover a lot in the town of Oroville, one hundred feet front by one hundred and thirty-two feet in depth. The complaint averred ownership and a right to the possession in January, 1859, and on ouster subsequently by the defendants. The answer denied plaintiff’s ownership, and averred that defendants and those through whom they claimed, had been the owners and in possession since April, 1856.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1863-07-01

How this case has been cited

Cited by 5 later decisions — most recently April 1907

5 state decisions

3018631870188018901900decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Field, C. J. delivered the opinion of the Court

¶1Cope, J. and Norton, J. concurring.

¶2The plaintiff avers in his complaint that in January, 1859, he was the owner and entitled to the possession of the premises in controversy, and in support of this averment proved on the trial that the parties through whom he traces title, in September, 1855, inclosed the premises with a brush fence from two to three feet in tight. No proof was offered that the plaintiff or his grantors ever subjected the premises to any uses whatever; and, on motion of the defendants, the Court ordered a nonsuit.

¶3The mere inclosure of a lot with a fence of this character, without any other steps being taken to subject the property to any use, is not sufficient evidence of ownership or right of possession in the plaintiff to sustain ejectment against one subsequently entering upon the premises. The nonsuit was therefore properly granted.

¶4Judgment affirmed.

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