Acquisition of Property Flashcards
Capture of wild animals
If wild animals (ferae naturae) are captured, usually the belong to the capturer. Capture is required, mere chasing the animal is not enough.
Interference by non-competitor
If a person is in the process of entrapping animals, a competitor who also wants to capture the animals can interfere with the other person’s activity and try to capture animals. But a person who does not want to capture the animal cannot interfere.
Escaped wild animals
If an animal that has no habit of return (animus revertendi) escapes, the captor loses possession and the animal is subject to capture by another.
Rights to oil and gas
A landowner can extract (“capture”) all the oil and gas from a well bottomed under the landowner’s land, even though the oil and gas may be drained for neighboring land.
Acquisition by accession
If one person adds to the property of another with labor or labor and new materials. A person is always entitled to the value of property taken, but person may lose title to accession.
Accession and raw materials
When someone adds labor to raw materials, courts generally give property back to owner of raw material unless person who has added labor has sufficiently increased value.
Rule of Capture
A person who captures otherwise unknown resources is entitled to the resources. Whoever is prior in time wins. The first person to take possession of a thing owns it.
Finders as owners
(1) the presumed intent of the original owner
(2) the identity of the competing claimants
(3) the location where the item is found.
Relativity of Title
True owner > Possessor (finder or even thief) > subsequent possessor
Treasure trove exception
Treasure trove is found gold, silver, or money intentionally buried or concealed in the soil with the intent of coming back to claim it. In English law, would go to the crown, but American courts do not always give to state.
Lost Property
When the owner unintentionally and involuntarily parts with it through neglect or inadvertence and does not know where it is.
Mislaid Property
When the owner voluntarily puts it in a particular place, intending to retain ownership, but then fails to reclaim it or forgets where it is.
Mislaid v. Lost Property
Lost property goes to finder rather than owner of premises. Mislaid property goes to owner of the premises.
Abandoned Property
Property that is intentionally abandoned by true owner, who no longer claims any right to it. Courts sometimes say it goes to finder but unreliable. If multiple finders, courts sometimes use rule of equitable division, where the judge orders to property sold and divides the proceeds among the claimants.
