Woodfolk's Heirs v. Witkowski

Citations

• 120 La. 489
• 45 So. 401
• 1908 La. LEXIS 531

Syllabus

<p>Taxation — Tax Title — Action to Set Aside —Laches.</p> <p>The present is a petitory action by which plaintiffs seek to be decreed the owners of the Ashton plantation, in East Carroll parish, fronting on the Mississippi river near the Arkansas line. Plaintiffs in their petition refer to certain tax sales under which the property has been sold, and to certain judicial proceedings to which the holders of the parties holding the legal title had recourse to confirm their title, as being radical nullities. Plaintiffs’ demand is rejected, and defendants’ title recognized. The property was sold at tax sale as far back as 1873. Plaintiffs’ father had anterior to that time left the property for which he was heavily indebted and gone to Mississippi to reside. He resided in Mississippi until his death, and his heirs have never returned to Louisiana. Neither plaintiffs’ father nor they themselves have, paid, nor offered to pay, a dollar of taxes on the property at any time later than 1869. They obviously abandoned it. In the meantime the tax purchasers have transformed the property from a wilderness into a plantation in cultivation, with extensive improvements upon it. Plaintiffs’ demand, for reasons assigned, is without equity or law to support it.</p> <p>[Ed. Note. — For cases in point, see Cent. Dig. vol. 45, Taxation, § 1564.]</p> <p>(Syllabus by the Court.)</p>