Briarwood of Silvermine, LLC v. Yew Street Partners, LLC

Citations

• 209 Conn. App. 271

Syllabus

The plaintiffs, B Co., the owner of certain real property in Norwalk, and D, the former owner of that property and the sole member of B Co., brought claims, inter alia, of adverse possession with respect to a contested area abutting property owned by the defendant, Y Co., and formerly owned by the defendant A. Following a bench trial, the trial court granted the defendants' oral motion to dismiss pursuant to the applicable rule of practice (§ 15-8). In concluding that the plaintiffs failed to establish a prima facie case of adverse possession, the court relied on its finding that D thought, erroneously, that the contested area belonged to her. Thereafter, the court, relying on its erroneous reasoning underlying its dismissal of the complaint, also rendered judgment for the defendants on their counterclaims seeking to quiet title and for trespass. On appeal, the plaintiffs claimed that the trial court erred by dismissing their com- plaint pursuant to Practice Book § 15-8, and by rendering judgment in favor of Y Co. on its counterclaim to quiet title, and in favor of A on her counterclaim for trespass. Held that the trial court erred in dismissing the plaintiffs' adverse possession claim because, when determining whether the plaintiffs had established a prima facie case, the court misapplied the law of adverse possession: the court operated under the mistaken understanding that a claimant's possession cannot be hostile if he or she believes that the contested property belongs to him or her, which represented a misunderstanding of the essential element of hostility; moreover, the court misunderstood and misapplied two additional elements of the law of adverse possession, namely, that a claimant's possession of contested property must last for an uninter- rupted period of fifteen years and that a claimant's possession must be open and visible, the court having erroneously stated that the require- ment that a claimant possess the contested property notoriously or hostile