Summary
The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed a district court ruling that the Wyoming Marketable Title Act validated PacifiCorp’s pole-line and utility easement across the Esterholdts’ property. The court held that a wild deed may constitute a root of title under the Act and that, when the defect is not apparent on the face of the instrument, it is not an inherent defect in the chain of record title.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether a wild deed can constitute the root of title under the Wyoming Marketable Title Act.
- Whether a wild deed is an inherent defect in the chain of record title under the Act.
Holdings
- A wild deed may constitute the root of title under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 34-10-101(a)(v) when it is a recorded conveyance or title transaction in the claimant's chain of title that purports to create the claimed interest and the statutory requirements for marketable record title are otherwise satisfied.
- A wild deed serving as a root of title is not an inherent defect under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 34-10-104(a)(i) when the defect does not appear on the face of the deed and can be determined only by examining title records preceding the root of title.
Key quotations
“A wild deed, as defined herein, may constitute the “root of title” under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 34-10-101(a)(v), and a wild deed serving as a root of title that does not bear a defect “on its face” is not an “inherent defect” in the chain of record title under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 34-10-104(a)(i).” (¶ 21)
Factual background
The Esterholdts owned property in Lincoln County that had been conveyed to Jeanne Esterholdt's grandfather in 1946, later conveyed to his daughter in 1968, and transferred to the Esterholdts in 2006. In 1967, before the 1968 conveyance, Reed granted a pole line easement to PacifiCorp's predecessor, signing as president of Continental Live Stock Company even though that company had no interest in the property. Because the easement was recorded more than forty years before the 2010 controversy and was the relevant instrument in the chain of title, the parties disputed whether it could serve as the root of title under Wyoming's Marketable Title Act.
Procedural history
The Esterholdts filed an action seeking a declaration that PacifiCorp's easement was invalid because it emanated from a wild deed. Jason Thornock intervened as a potential user of PacifiCorp's power line. The Lincoln County District Court granted partial summary judgment to the appellees on the Marketable Title Act issues, and the Esterholdts appealed. The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed.