« Law - "Blast faxes" and Robo-Calls | Main | Ind. Decisions - "Lap-Band Surgery to be Covered By Pizza Shop" »
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Ind. Courts - "In court case about path, a loss looks a lot like a win"
Bob Zaltsberg, editor of the Bloomington Herald-Times, reported this story ($$) on August 31st:
Jeff Sagarin has been fighting City Hall. A court ruling last week says he lost.Depends on your perspective.
Sagarin, a mathematics genius with all the quirkiness that might be associated with such a gift, became incensed and a bit obsessed when he learned in 2007 that an asphalt path the city put on property he now owns may have been built illegally.
The path is also on the property of his neighbor, Shirley Jablonski, who shared his irritation. When notified, the person who owned the home at the time the path was installed, Deborah Campbell, also became miffed.
The women’s anger stemmed from their memories of 1972, when a city official told Mrs. Jablonski and her now-deceased husband, Robert, as well as Mrs. Campbell, that the city had an easement for the property and could build the path without the property owners’ permission. They believed the city official, and the path was built.
When the city informed Sagarin a couple of years ago it planned to widen the path, he went looking for the easement so he would understand his rights.
He couldn’t find it. So he and Mrs. Jablonski went to court.
As they fought on, Sagarin was painted unfavorably by people in the neighborhood who like to use the path. Some people suggested he was heartless because the path was built after two school-aged children were killed on nearby High Street in separate mishaps years apart.
But the facts from news coverage of the events show it is highly suspect the path would have made a difference in either tragedy. Other factors, like a stop sign that wasn’t erected until too late, would have had more direct impact.
Sagarin was an easy target for critics. To strangers, he displays the warmth of a mathematical theorem. But he’s also exceedingly principled and equally persistent.
He fumed over this case because he feels the city took property it didn’t have a right to, and when it learned it had done so wouldn’t admit it. The issue to him has always been abuse of power.
Last week, Judge Steve Galvin ruled against Sagarin, saying he knew the path was there when he bought his home. But that decision is not nearly as important to Sagarin as the ruling Galvin made in favor of his neighbor, Shirley Jablonski, and the harsh words dished out to the city.
“The statements made by the representatives of the City of Bloomington were false and clearly made with the intent to mislead,” Galvin wrote. “... It is clear that the representatives of the City of Bloomington made false and misleading statements to the Jablonskis and to Deborah Campbell concerning the existence of an easement for a path. It is equally clear that they knew these representations to be false.”
Galvin has ordered the city to pay Shirley Jablonski for the land they took from her and her husband, and pay 35 years of interest on the value of the property.
That’s a reasonable conclusion, and vindication for Sagarin. Who cares about a ruling on a piece of paper saying he gets nothing in the case?
He gets the satisfaction of knowing city government didn’t get away with perpetrating a fraud on citizens back in 1972.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on September 1, 2009 06:00 PM
Posted to Ind. Trial Ct. Decisions