Key Points

  • The New York Court of Appeals, in a 5-2 unsigned memorandum, affirmed summary judgment granting the Genesee County Fish and Game Protective Association title by adverse possession to the eastern half of Godfrey's Pond Road.
  • The majority held that the association's proof established each element of adverse possession and that the defendants raised no triable issue of fact, citing evidence that only the association had plowed, paved, repaired and maintained the entire road for decades.
  • The majority invoked adverse possession's policy of repose while limiting its holding to the unique facts of the case.
  • Judge Rivera, joined by Chief Judge Wilson, dissented, writing that the parties' decades-long cordial and associational relationship raised fact questions about permissive use that precluded summary judgment on hostility and exclusivity.
  • The decision affirms a 3-2 Fourth Department ruling in which Justices DelConte and Hannah had dissented on the same grounds.

New York's highest court on Oct. 22 awarded a Genesee County conservation club ownership of its neighbors' half of a private road the two sides had shared for decades. The court held that the club had acquired the land by adverse possession, a doctrine under which someone who openly and exclusively occupies another's property without permission for at least 10 years can take title, and that the club was entitled to win without a trial.

The Court of Appeals ruled 5-2 in an unsigned memorandum, affirming decisions in favor of the Genesee County Fish and Game Protective Association. Judges Garcia, Singas, Cannataro, Troutman and Halligan joined the memorandum. Judge Rivera dissented in an opinion joined by Chief Judge Wilson, writing that the record raised factual disputes that only a trial could resolve.

The ruling extinguishes the title of Capri Dix and her husband, William Dix, to the eastern half of Godfrey's Pond Road and leaves the association owning the entire road. The Appellate Division had described the road as "the only access to the property for plaintiff's members, emergency services vehicles, and delivery services." The majority confined its holding to what it called the case's "unique facts." The dissent argued that the court had let a disfavored claim succeed on a record showing decades of shared, friendly use.

The association, incorporated in 1909, owns a 200-acre parcel in Genesee County that serves about 1,500 members, 21 of whom live on the property, according to the memorandum. Capri Dix, a former member, owns a 45-acre parcel to the east that she and her husband use for recreation. The association has owned the western half since 1932, and the Dixes and their predecessors have held the eastern half since at least 1949.

The dispute began in 2021. The memorandum, quoting the Appellate Division, cited "several provocative actions primarily taken by defendants and members of their family, including blocking the eastern half of the road with tree trunks," and an encounter between association members and the Dixes that required police intervention. According to the dissent, the Dixes believed the club's members were improperly entering their land, and they rejected the association's offer to buy the eastern half of the road.

The association then sued, seeking a declaration that it owned the eastern half by adverse possession. It also pleaded, in the alternative, a prescriptive easement, a right to use another's land that stops short of ownership. The Dixes counterclaimed for title to the strip and for trespass. The state Supreme Court granted the association summary judgment, the procedure that lets a court decide a case without a trial when the material facts are undisputed. The Appellate Division's Fourth Department affirmed 3-2, and the Dixes appealed to the Court of Appeals as of right.

"We agree with the courts below that, on the unique facts of this case, plaintiff was entitled to summary judgment," the court wrote. It held that the association's proof on each element of adverse possession was sufficient and that the Dixes "raised no triable issue of fact."

Among the evidence of hostile and exclusive possession, the court pointed to the Appellate Division's finding that "it was only plaintiff that had plowed, patched, paved, repaired, and otherwise maintained the entire road for decades." The court acknowledged that adverse possession is "not a favored method of procuring title." It added, quoting its own 2025 decision in Golobe v. Mielnicki, that the doctrine is a "necessary means of clearing disputed titles" and serves an "important policy of repose." "It is time for repose here," the court concluded.

Judge Rivera's dissent opened by describing the case as "a property dispute between neighbors." Judge Rivera wrote that "the record is replete with outstanding factual and credibility questions as to whether plaintiff exclusively used the disputed property without defendants' consent." The dissenters would have reversed and sent the case back for trial.

The dissent centered on permission. Under the court's precedents, Judge Rivera wrote, possession accompanied by the usual acts of ownership is presumed hostile to the owner, but a "close and cooperative relationship" between the owner and the claimant may defeat that presumption. If the club's use of the road was merely permissive, the dissent said, the club could not establish hostility or exclusivity, two of the five required elements.

The dissent cataloged ties between the Dix family and the club. Capri Dix's mother, grandmother, great aunt and great-grandfather had all been members, and relatives rode horses on the road and on the club's trails. Her great-grandfather, Vincent Frens, let the club take gravel from a pit on his land to pave and patch the road and allowed members to hunt on his property. Judge Rivera also pointed to "some evidence in the record" that Frens gave the members permission to use the eastern half of the road, though several longtime members denied knowing until the dispute that the club did not own the whole road.

The dissent rejected the majority's reliance on finality. "I agree with the majority that repose is a worthy goal," Judge Rivera wrote, but "repose is not an appropriate justification to excuse plaintiff's failure to establish by clear and convincing evidence" its claim. "It would be a different case without this close, cooperative, and long-standing associational relationship between the parties and their predecessors in interest, but those ties cannot be disentangled on a summary judgment motion," the dissent concluded.

Two Appellate Division justices, DelConte and Hannah, had dissented on the same grounds, finding triable questions on whether the club's use was hostile and exclusive. Judge Rivera called their opinion "well-reasoned."

John M. Wells represented the Dixes, and John F. Whiting represented the association, according to the opinion.

The Court of Appeals affirmed the Appellate Division's order with costs. The affirmance leaves in place the trial court's grant of summary judgment to the association and its denial of the Dixes' cross-motion to quiet title in their own names. The association's alternative prescriptive-easement claim was not part of its motion, and the dissent did not reach it.