Summary
The Supreme Court of Virginia affirmed a circuit court judgment involving riparian rights, adverse possession, the statute of limitations for ejectment, and Code § 28.2-1200.1(B)(2). The Court held that a settlement agreement waived Ferguson’s prior adverse-possession-related claims and that an unchallenged alternative basis independently supported the ruling concerning the statute. It also upheld the determination that the oyster house was a fixture and affirmed the order requiring Ferguson to vacate it.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the settlement agreement waived or barred Ferguson's statute-of-limitations defense to the ejectment action.
- Whether Ferguson could rely on Code § 28.2-1200.1(B)(2) despite failing to assign error to every independent basis for the circuit court's ruling.
- Whether the oyster house was a fixture attached to realty or personal property that Ferguson could remove.
Holdings
- The settlement agreement's broad mutual release extinguished Ferguson's prior adverse-possession claims, and his statute-of-limitations plea in the ejectment action was effectively a reassertion of the same claim; therefore, the plea was waived and properly dismissed.
- An appellant cannot obtain appellate relief from a ruling supported by multiple independent legal grounds without assigning error to each ground. Because Ferguson conceded that he did not challenge the circuit court's vested-rights ground, that independent ground was sufficient to affirm the ruling.
- The oyster house was a fixture attached to the realty, and the circuit court properly directed Ferguson to vacate it and the other portions of the plaintiffs' riparian zone.
Key quotations
“the acquisition of title by adverse possession and the statute of limitations for ejectment are inextricably linked” (at 4)
“a party who challenges the ruling of a lower court must on appeal assign error to each articulated basis for that ruling.” (at 6-7)
“The intention of the party making the annexation is the paramount and controlling consideration.” (at 8)
Factual background
Ferguson received a permit in 1955 to construct a causeway to an island in the Rappahannock River and acquired the island and causeway by quitclaim deed in 1998, knowing the Commonwealth owned the underlying bottomlands. After a prior riparian-rights dispute, Ferguson agreed to purchase Bozeman's shoreline property for $350,000 and mutually release all claims, but he later defaulted. The circuit court determined that Bozeman owned the shoreline property and riparian rights and that the Commonwealth owned the bottomlands; it later ordered Ferguson to vacate an oyster house that he had built on the island, expanded with living quarters, and connected to a septic system.
Procedural history
Bozeman previously sued Ferguson concerning riparian rights, and the parties settled with Ferguson agreeing to purchase Bozeman's shoreline property and mutually releasing claims. After Ferguson defaulted on the purchase payment, Bozeman obtained an order establishing ownership and riparian-rights determinations. Bozeman then filed an ejectment action, later continued by her heirs, and the circuit court dismissed Ferguson's statute-of-limitations plea, rejected his statutory defense, awarded possession of the oyster house to Stokes, and ordered Ferguson to vacate. The Supreme Court of Virginia affirmed.