Hunting On Your Own Land, Gets Owner Arrested For Trespassing!

[Pathfinder]

I'm going to give LE the benefit for the time being.  There is a lot not said in the article, and it is possible that Engelking may not have been "very polite" and the deputy was taking the safe side for all involved.

Next reports should clear it up, and then I may rant.  This coming from someone that has used farm equipment to block workers with an easement until he could get some answers.

Let me get this straight. If a landowner comes across trespassers on his land, and when a deputy shows up, if the landowner isn't "polite" to the nice deputy, it's the land owner that lands in jail? And that's OK with you?

F that. If I catch trespassers on my land, politeness is the last thing anyone better be thinking about. Hell, I chased down trespassers on the BNSF track on the north edge of my property - shooters from New Mexico up for the pheasants - who had been shooting over my corrals and crossing marked land. Ran after them with my ATV and a 9mm in very plain sight.

[twyacht]

I live about 50 miles from Superior WI, It is the closest big town to me.  I also have a friend who works for a sub contractor for the pipeline.  The pipeline has been a very controversial issue for some years now, a massive project.  I know the guys who work for northern clearing have to go to daily meetings where they talk about safety and where they can/cannot walk as trespassing is a big liability concern.  Alot of landowners get mad about work thats done, and how it effects their land even though it has already been hashed out legally.

Hello WIshooter as a duly elected "local" please let us know of anything relevant to the pipeline, how it effects the locals, and whatever the main stream media may leave out of the story.

We only get headline snippets and to have a local with more resources to the "real deal" would be great.

On the face of the story, the Sheriff mat have been kinda a jerk, while at the same time the property owner could have escalated the situation to his being arrested.

Keep us in the know if you can. welcome to DRTV..

tw

[WIshooter]

I guess I can say that this sort of thing doesn't surprise me.  I know it's not the first incident between landowners and the pipeline workers/police.  I feel bad for the guy, but would bet that the workers had been approved to be where they were.  The cops are probably sick of the situation.  Pure speculation on my part.

[fightingquaker13]

My dad has a friend who works for a pipeline company, buying/executing easement rights. I emailed her on this issue. She says that problems arise when folks have easements that were bought 30 years ago, often for pennies on the dollar,and are now being executed.This is particularly true with the second or third owner who didn't pay attention to paragragh 34 sub section c of their deed and didn't realize that there was going to be a loud smelly easement on their land.
FQ13 who has said it before and will say it again. Before you buy real property, spend the $1500-$2000 it will cost to have real estate lawyer go over the deed line by line. In this case an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. My stepdad did contract law for small businesses. He said he made his money from people who were too cheap to buy two hours of his time before they they signed the contract, and then had to pay for 100 hours to get out of it after the deal went bad. Not bad advice.
FQ13

[MikeBjerum]

Let me get this straight. If a landowner comes across trespassers on his land, and when a deputy shows up, if the landowner isn't "polite" to the nice deputy, it's the land owner that lands in jail? And that's OK with you?

F that. If I catch trespassers on my land, politeness is the last thing anyone better be thinking about. Hell, I chased down trespassers on the BNSF track on the north edge of my property - shooters from New Mexico up for the pheasants - who had been shooting over my corrals and crossing marked land. Ran after them with my ATV and a 9mm in very plain sight.

Path,

If the company has an easement it is most likely not trespassing.  I have only seen one binding easement contract that said the land owner had to be contacted prior to access, and it was due to landowner activity that was privacy sensitive (gov. contractor).  The reason for an easement is to give someone, the utility in this case, unlimited access to someone's property.  They pay for this right up front, and they they pay for any damage they cause after that.

In this case if the utility had a valid easement in place Engleking was most likely in the wrong.  Your case was a different situation involving hunters rather than a utility with legal rights performing their work.

We run into this all the time with our power lines and trees.  We have codes that do not allow certain plantings under or near power lines, and easements that say we can trim or remove trees that interfere.  We trim trees the best we can, and sometimes we remove, but to be "nice" we very seldom pass on the bill to the land owner who is responsible, and we even give them replacement plantings.  However, we have people that seem to think the rules don't pertain to them and that the easement is not legally binding because it "takes away their property rights."

WIshooter's post adds to my thoughts in my first post.  We'll wait and see.

[Sponsor]

[tombogan03884]

 From what the OP said the land owner knew all about the easement, but it had not been paid for yet.

From the OP
"told workers they had no right to be on his property because he had received no compensation from Enbridge Energy Partners L.P. for an easement."

[MikeBjerum]

Douglas County Circuit Court Judge George Glonek granted a temporary injunction but lifted it the following day, saying the company’s plans for the pipeline were appropriate and efforts had been made to pay the Engelkings.

[Timothy]

I owned property in CT back in the 90's.  We had an easement issue with the town and Northeast Utilities wherein we had to grant them access to the 100 gap between my house and my neighbors.  I also shared a driveway easement with my neighbor.  I was never compensated for it and in fact, I probably kept the value of both properties lower because of it.  I know it was an issue when I sold the home because I reduced my sale price because of it's existence.  I had little choice, I needed to sell!