Heilbron v. Heinlen

Belcher, C. C. This is an action to recover damages for trespass upon real property.

It is alleged in the complaint that for more than two years last past, the plaintiffs had been seised and possessed of all that certain tract of land in the counties of Fresno and Tulare, known as the rancho Laguna de Tache, containing about forty-eight thousand acres, and for which a patent, dated March 6, 1866, was issued by the United States to Manuel Castro; that on the seventeenth day of December, 1883, the plaintiffs were engaged in constructing a fence of posts and wire along the right bank of Kings River, which is the southern boundary of [372]the rancho, and had completed the fence for a great part of said line; that on the day named, the defendants, without right and against the will of plaintiffs, cut and destroyed the said fence for a distance of about one and a half miles on sections 30 and 31 in township 18 south, range 20 east, and on a portion of section 36 in township 18 south, range 19 east, and also cut and destroyed the posts which had been set by plaintiffs for the purpose of building a fence for a distance of about two and one half miles on sections 1 and 2 in township 19 south, range 19 east.

The defendants, by their answer, deny that the plaintiffs are or ever were seised or possessed, or entitled to the possession, of the lands described in their complaint; deny that the plaintiffs at the time named, or at any time, were engaged in constructing, or had constructed, any fence along the right bank of Kings River; and deny that at any time they, or either of them, ever cut or destroyed any fence for any distance, on any sections, in any township or range, or cut or destroyed any posts on any sections, in any township or range, or at all, upon any lands of plaintiffs, or any or either of them, or that the posts or fence, alleged to have been cut or destroyed, were situate upon any lands of the plaintiffs, or either of them.

At the trial, the plaintiffs introduced in evidence the patent, with the map attached thereto, from the United States to Castro, deeds from Castro conveying the whole rancho-to Jeremiah Clark, and a lease of the whole rancho, dated May T, 1880, from Clark to-the plaintiffs, for a term often years. They then-called a-witness to prove the buildingof the fence and setting of the posts along the right bank of Kings River- on the seetions named, and that the fence and posts were cut and destroyed by certain parties, who said they were in the employment of defendants.