[WSBARP] easement

[Scott Thomas]

In defending against a claim of a prescriptive easement, I have come across
an issue I had not considered before.  Seems that claimant is basing her
claim on the use of the claimed easement by claimant's family members - in
particular, the claimant's adult children, grandchildren, and the
grandchildren's spouses.  This is not a situation of tacking, but rather
use of a claimed easement imputed to the claimant.  None of the individual
claimant's have used the claimed easement often enough to satisfy the
requirement of continuity; one grandchild uses the claimed easement one
year, and another grandchild uses the claimed easement another year, and so
on.  To me, the problem is that elements of a prescriptive easement require
that a particular person make use of an owner's land for the necessary
period, or that the successive use by two or more persons who have a
particular relationship (typically, successors in interest) be tacked
together to meet the relevant statute of limitations.  And so a group of
people with a tenuous connection would not meet that test.  Then I
remember, it is possible for the public to establish a public ROW by
prescription.  So I remain confused.  Any thoughts?

Scott Thomas
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/wsbarp/attachments/20170829/bdf743d6/attachment.html>