Trespass to Land cases

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Bernstein v Skyviews [1978]

Facts: Skyviews took photos of Bernstein's manor house from the air and tried to sell him the photos. Berstein wanted to sue for trespass to his airspace

Held: The court applied some common sense - hey said that you own the airspace that is necessary for the ordinary use and enjoyment of your land

Gregory v Piper (1829)

Held: It is a sufficiently direct incursion on another's land to leave rubbish on your land (but near the claimant's land) that later roles onto the claimant's land because of the wind i.e. that would be trespass of land

Hemmings v Stoke Poges GC [1920]

Facts: Hemmings was employed at the golf club and as part of his employment he was given a cottage on the land of the golf club. At some point, Hemmings was told to leave his job and subsequently leave the cottage. He didn’t want to go so the golf club just went into the house took out all of his possessions and put them outside, lifted him up and put him outside and lifted his wife up (carrying baby) and put her outside

Held: This was an exercise of ejection against the trespasser (using, apparenly, reasonable force)

Inverugie Investment v Hackett [1995]

Facts: In this case a man opened a hotel and someone came along and took it

Held: The court said if you are going to take his hotel you are going to have to pay rent for that (i.e. that meant paying for ALL the rooms in the hotel himself). In other words, the claimant's remedy was a mesne profit.

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CONTENT

J A Pye v Graham 2003

Facts: J A PYE Ltd granted Graham a licence to use part of its land for agriculture. The licence expired, and Graham repeatedly asked for renewal of the licence but the company refused to do so. However, Graham continued to use the land as he had been previously, during which time it was accessible only through a gate which Graham kept padlocked

Held: The House of Lords concluded that Graham had factual possession of the land → he had complete and exclusive control of that land demonstrated by the padlocked gate

Kelsen v Imperial Tobacco (1957)

Facts: The neighbour of a property had an advertising hoard that projected 8cm over the building (i.e. the airspace) next door

Held: This was held to be a trespass and, therefore, the claimant could insiste the hoard gets taken down or charge money for it being there

League Against Cruel Sports v Scott [1986]

Facts: This case shows that trespass can result from negligent failure to ensure dogs do not go onto another’s land. The League Against Cruel Sports is anti-hunting and they also buy small pockets of land and use them as nature reserves – this is to make areas that are safe for animals and, also, the more land they buy they hope they can force out hunting. In this case, there was a hunt going on and the dogs (used by the hunters) were going onto the League's land. As a result, the League sued the hunt master who was responsible. The question was: was the league master intentionally setting the dogs upon the land?

Held: The court said they could infer an intention to trespass from "the indifference to such incursions while persisting to hunt near the claimant’s property". Thus, the defendant was found guilty of trespass.

London Borough of Enfield v Outdoor Plus [2012]

Facts: Outdoor Plus put up a big advertising hoarding and they got it slightly wrong as it was a few inches onto Enfield’s land.

Held: The court said they could assume Outdoor Plus intended to put the hoarding on their land, and therefore Enfield would expect a fee for using their land. TThe court said they will award Enfield that fee – the money Outdoor Plus would have paid to use Enfield’s land i.e. a hypothetical license fee

Star Energy v Bocado [2010]

Facts: Star Energy were digging for oil and were putting pipes underneath somebody else’s land (2000 feet underneath the ground).

Held: This was still held to be trespass i.e. trespassing 2000 feet underneath your land may be seen as trespass. The court said the owner was "entitled to the surface itself and everything below it down to the centre of the earth” (from Rowbotham v Wilson (1860)), but as long as this was applied sensibly e.g. at a certain point beyond the crust it is impossible for any human activity to take place: Sprankling, 2008

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