Response To Cert Application In Land Court Registration Case

by Robert Thomas, InverseCondemnation October 23, 20123

Here's the Response to Application for Writ of Certiorari by the State of Hawaii, which opposes the State's cert app asking the Hawaii Supreme Court to review for grave error the Intermediate Court of Appeals' opinion in In re Trustees Under the Will of the Estate of James Campbell, No. 30006 (June 13, 2013).

That's the case in which the ICA held that the intent of the land court registration provisions (Torrens title) in Chapter 501 of the Hawaii Revised Statutes is to "preserve the integrity of titles," slip op. at 11, and "a certificate of title is unimpeachable and conclusive except as otherwise provided by law." Id. That seems straightfoward enough, as any dirt lawyer in a state with a Torrens registration system knows. These systems, in which the state guarantees indefeasable title to the rights and interests reflected in the register, remain active in a few states, including Hawaii (more background here).

[Disclosure: we filed an amicus brief in the ICA in support of the property owner.]

Campbell's opposition argues that "[t]his is a simple Land Court subdivision case," and that the

real question presented by the State's Application is whether the Territory relinquished its reservation of mineral and metallic mines in the Subject Property when, in 1937, it appeared and affirmatively raised its interests in Land Court Application No. 1095 without claiming a reservation of mineral or metallic mine, and whether the State's failure to appeal the Land Court's Original Decision and Original Decree which determined that the land was free and clear of a mineral or metallic reservation, should be excused, in disregard of the Land Court statute, case law and the reasonable expectations of bona fide purchasers who took title for value and in good faith.

BIO at 2.

TEXT: Respondent-Appellee James Campbell Company LLC's Response to Application for Writ of Certiorari by the Stat...

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