Higgins v. Kadjevich

KAUFMAN, P. J. Defendant appeals from a judgment decreeing plaintiffs have an irrevocable license to transport water through the existing irrigation pipeline on defendant’s land and enjoining defendant from interfering in any manner with the plaintiffs’ use and enjoyment thereof.

The trial court found the following facts: The plaintiffs, I. M. and E. Higgins, N. and F. Laznibat, are the owners in fee of certain parcels of real property on Grant Road near the intersection of Grant Road and Sladky Avenue in Los Altos. The defendant, Kadjevich, also owns real property on Grant Road near that of the plaintiffs; on defendant’s land there is a well and pipeline with the necessary gates and valves. The plaintiffs and defendant used the pipeline from 1931 until 1956, under a written agreement, which terminated in the spring of 1956. Since the termination of the written agreement, the plaintiffs and the defendant have continued to use the pipeline for the purpose of conveying irrigation water to the premises of both parties.

In 1955, piaintiff, Ira M. Higgins, and defendant, Nick Kadjevich, entered into an oral agreement to construct an extension of the existing pipeline running to the well on the Higgins property. The agreement also provided that Nick Kadjevich would have the first right to the water from the Higgins well after Higgins and that Higgins would have the first right to water from the Kadjevich well after Kadjevich, and that the existing pipeline and the extension would provide the means of transporting the irrigation water.

Plaintiff, Ira M. Higgins, in reliance on the oral agreement, constructed the extension at his sole expense, in the approximate amount of $1,000. After the construction of the extension, both parties used the pipeline and extension as agreed. The parties used the pipeline and control valves during the [522]irrigation season of 1957 and 1958. The pipeline and its control valves have been continuously relied upon by the plaintiffs to irrigate their valuable prune and apricot trees. Plaintiffs have no other practical method of irrigating their premises, and if cut off from the pipeline, plaintiffs could not as a practical matter, irrigate their orchards.

The defendant, Kadjevich, has prevented the flow of water through the pipeline. This interference with the flow of irrigation water caused a delay in propping the limbs of the bearing fruit trees in the orchard of plaintiffs, Ira M. Higgins and Elise Higgins, and proximately caused damages in the amount of $1,000. The trial court further found that each of the parties owns the pipeline which lies on his respective property and each has the right to transport water through the entire pipeline without interference by any other party.