Irons v Corporation of the President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints [2019] FMSC 5; 22 FSM R. 158 (Chk. 2019) (28 January 2019)

FSM SUPREME COURT TRIAL DIVISION
CIVIL ACTION NO. 2016-1014

FRANK IRONS,
Plaintiff,

vs.

CORPORATION OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE
CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER
DAY SAINTS,
Defendant.
__________________________________________

FINDINGS OF FACT AND CONCLUSIONS OF LAW

Larry Wentworth
Associate Justice

Trial: December 12-13, 2018
Decided: January 28, 2019

APPEARANCES:

For the Plaintiff: Johnny Meippen, Esq.
P.O. Box 705
Weno, Chuuk FM 96942

For the Defendant: Erick B. Divinigracia, Esq.
Ramp & Mida Law Firm
P.O. Box 1480
Kolonia, Pohnpei FM 96941

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HEADNOTES

Torts - Conversion
Only personal property (personalty) can be subject to conversion; real property cannot. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 161 (Chk. 2019).

Torts - Trespass
The court’s role in a civil trespass case is to determine which party has the greater right to possession of the disputed property. It is not an action to determine title. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 162 (Chk. 2019).

Torts - Trespass
An action for trespass is broadly defined in the FSM as a wrongful interference with another’s possessory interest in the real property. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 162 (Chk. 2019).

Torts - Damages - Nominal; Torts - Trespass
A plaintiff has the burden to prove the amount of any damages caused by the trespass. But a plaintiff’s failure to proffer any evidence of monetary damages is, however, not fatal to his trespass claim because monetary damages are not an essential element of the trespass tort since, in a successful trespass action when evidence of actual damages is lacking, the trial court will award nominal ($1) damages. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 163 (Chk. 2019).

Judgments; Torts - Trespass
Even though the plaintiff did not plead an ejectment cause of action, the court could, if he proves he has a greater current possessory right to the land, grant the plaintiff actual possession of land through an ejectment remedy because, except as to a party against whom a judgment is entered by default, every final judgment shall grant the relief to which the party in whose favor it is rendered is entitled, even if the party has not demanded such relief in the party’s pleadings. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 163 (Chk. 2019).

Contracts - Necessity of Writing
There is no statute of frauds - a law requiring that certain agreements or contracts to be in writing before they are enforceable in court - in Chuuk. Customarily, any agreement, even that selling land, might be oral. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 163 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Deeds
When, despite the use of the words "will" and "inherited," a document titled "Deed of Will" can only be an inter vivos deed transferring, on the date it was executed, whatever interest the grantor had on that date in the land to his son, because, if it were meant to be a will, it would undoubtedly have included bequests to some or all of the grantor’s other children and mention other holdings, but it does not. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 163 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration; Property - Leases
Any lease or use rights for a term not exceeding one year does not need to be stated in the certificate of title to be effective. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 163 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration; Property - Leases
A long-term lease (a lease for greater than one year), is an interest in land subject to Land Commission adjudication and must be stated in the certificate of title for it to be effective against third parties. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 163 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration; Property - Leases
A long-term lessee is entitled to notice as an interested party - as a claimant to an interest in that land - when that land is first registered. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 164 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration; Property - Leases
Persons, including a purported long-term lessee, known to a claimant, if not to the Land Commission, to claim interests in the land, are entitled, as interested parties, to actual notice of any Land Commission proceedings determining the land’s ownership and other interests therein. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 164 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration
It is to a land claimant’s advantage and great benefit to make sure that the Land Commission gives actual notice to everyone that the land claimant knows has or makes some sort of claim to the land that the claimant claims is his own. That is because a certificate of title, once issued, is conclusive upon all persons who have had actual or constructive notice of the proceedings and all those claiming under them, but is otherwise only "prima facie evidence of such ownership. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 164 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration
When a long-term lessee was an interested party entitled to notice of the Land Commission proceedings determining the ownership of and interests in the land and when it never received any actual or constructive notice of the proceedings that determined ownership, the new owner’s certificate of title is not conclusive against the lessee. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 164 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration
Even when not conclusive, a certificate of title is generally prima facie evidence of such ownership. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 164 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration
A certificate of title is ineffective against someone who was entitled to notice of the determination of ownership proceedings but did not receive any. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 164 (Chk. 2019).

Property - Land Registration; Torts - Trespass
When the plaintiff’s certificate of title (and underlying determination of ownership) is ineffective against the lessee, the plaintiff has not shown by the preponderance of the evidence that he has a current possessory interest in the land superior to that of the lessee on the land. Irons v. Corporation of the President of the Church of Latter Day Saints, 22 FSM R. 158, 164 (Chk. 2019).

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COURT’S OPINION

LARRY WENTWORTH, Associate Justice:

This case was tried on December 12-13, 2018. After the plaintiff, Frank Irons, finished presenting his case-in-chief, the defendant, the Corporation of the President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (hereinafter "the Church") moved, under Civil Procedure Rule 41(b), to dismiss the plaintiff’s case because, on the facts and the law, he had not shown any right to relief. The court then dismissed the plaintiff’s conversion claim because this case is about land and its possession. Only personal property (personalty) can be subject to conversion; real property cannot. Setik v. Mendiola, 21 FSM R. 537, 555 (App. 2018). The court also dismissed the plaintiff’s conspiracy and unjust enrichment claims because he had failed to produce evidence to meet the elements of those causes of action. Trial then proceeded on Frank Irons’s trespass claim.

Based on the testimony of Frank Irons, Matasio Wainit, and William Davis, and the evidence admitted, the court makes the following

FINDINGS OF FACT.

1. There is a parcel of land on Udot island in Truk Lagoon known as Wisasar.

2. At one time, Arthur Irons owned Wisasar.

3. Frank Irons and Leo Irons are both sons of Arthur Irons. They have other siblings.

4. On November 3, 1992, Arthur Irons signed a document, entitled "Deed of Will," which was witnessed by two others, and which "certified" that Arthur Irons had "inherited to my son, Leo Irons, the following lands as stated below: 1. Wisasar . . . ." Def.’s Ex. C (aedached as Ex. 2) (listing three and a half lands transferred to Leo Irons by Arthur Irons). There was no evidence about whether this document was ever recorded at the Chuuk Land Coion.

6. On March 15, 1995, Leo Irons leased Wisasar to the Church for a term of twenty-five years for a total of $10,000, which was paid in full to Leo Irons on March 16, 1995. Def.’s Ex. C. There was no evidence about whether this lease was ever recorded at the Chuuk Land Commission.

7. The Church relied on the November 3, 1992 "Deed of Will" and the March 3, 1994 state court preliminary injunction to satisfy itself that Leo Irons owned Wisasar and thus had the authority to lease it to the Church. Udot island was not a land registration area in 1995.

8. The Church did not exercise its rights under the lease or occupy Wisasar until much later.

9. In 2012, Leo Irons and Church officials discussed making use of the Wisasar lease. By then, the Church had enough congregants on Udot for it to establish a Church "group" there and to feel the need to have a building constructed on Wisasar to house its Udot missionaries.

10. On December 3, 2015, Pacific Landscaping, Engineering & Construction, Inc. submitted a $49,795 bid to build the "LDS Udot Missionary Home." Def.’s Ex. D. The bid was accepted.

11. The Udot missionary house construction was finished in April 2016. It was thereafter used to house the Church’s missionaries, with religious services conducted under a tent next to the house.

12. Leo Irons had passed away by then.

13. Frank Irons, who of his siblings had remained with his father, Arthur Irons, the longest, had moved to Guam in 1989. He did not return to Chuuk until 2000.

14. At some point after his return, Frank Irons learned that the Church was occupying, or would occupy, Wisasar under a lease executed by Leo Irons.

15. Because of this, Frank Irons, asserting that Arthur Irons had orally granted him Wisasar sometime in the 1980s, sought a Chuuk Land Commission determination that Wisasar was his. The Land Commission instituted registration proceedings.

16. The Church did not receive any notice of the Land Commission proceeding. There is no evidence whether Leo Irons, or his heirs, received any notice of Frank Irons’s claim or of the Land Commission proceedings. It is also unknown whether the Land Commission was aware of Arthur Irons’s 1992 "Deed of Will" to Leo Irons, or of the Church’s lease, when it proceeded to determine the title to Wisasar.

17. On July 6, 2015, the Land Commission issued a determination of ownership for Wisasar, stating that Frank Irons owned it in fee simple. Pl.’s Ex. 1.

18. On September 15, 2016, Frank Irons sent a letter, with his determination of ownership attached, to the Church’s property and facilities manager for the Micronesia area (at a Guam address). In this letter, Frank Irons stated, "As you are probably aware, your Church’s lease of my family land [on Udot] has expired this year. The family invites you to continue your lease of the land. We need to enter into an extended or new lease agreement since your concrete structure is still standing on the land. . . ." Def.’s Ex. A. The Church did not reply. By its terms, the Church’s lease of Wisasar does not expire until March 15, 2020.

19. Frank Irons filed this lawsuit on November 18, 2016.

20. On December 15, 2016, the Land Commission issued a certificate of title in fee simple to Frank Irons for Wisasar. Pl.’s Ex. 2.

In light of these findings, the court makes the following

CONCLUSIONS OF LAW.

1. The court’s role in a civil trespass case is to determine which party has the greater right to possession of the disputed property. Nelson v. Kosrae, 8 FSM R. 397, 403 (App. 1998); Kiniol v. Kansou, 12 FSM R. 335, 336 (Chk. 2004). It is not an action to determine title. Rosario v. College of Micronesia-FSM, 11 FSM R. 355, 359 (App. 2003); Ponape Enterprises Co. v. Soumwei, 6 FSM R. 341, 345 (Pon. 1994) (in a trespass case, the standard is who has better right of possession not who has the better title). An action for trespass is broadly defined in the FSM as a wrongful interference with another’s possessory interest in the real property. Nakamura v. FSM Telecomm. Corp., 17 FSM R. 119, 124 (Chk. 2010); Mailo v. Chuuk, 13 FSM R. 462, 466 (Chk. 2005); Nelper v. Akinaga, Pangelinan & Saita Co., 8 FSM R. 528, 533 (Pon. 1998). Thus, Frank Irons, as plaintiff, had the burden to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that he has a greater current right to possession of Wisasar and that the Church’s interference with that possessory right is wrongful. Nakamura v. FSM Telecomm. Corp., 17 FSM R. 119, 123 (Chk. 2010) (plaintiff in a civil case has the burden of proving each element of his cause of action by a preponderance of the evidence, and if the plaintiff fails to prove any one element, judgment will be entered against the plaintiff); Sandy v. Mori, 17 FSM R. 92, 95 (Chk. 2010); Pohnpei Transfer & Storage, Inc. v. Shoniber, 21 FSM R. 14, 17 (Pon. 2016); George v. Palsis, 19 FSM R. 558, 566 (Kos. 2014).

2. Frank Irons also has the burden to prove the amount of any damages caused by the trespass. He did not prove any amount. He did not even proffer any evidence of monetary damages.^[1] This is, however, not fatal to his trespass claim. Monetary damages are not an essential element of the trespass tort since, in a successful trespass action when evidence of actual damages is lacking, the trial court will award nominal ($1) damages. Carlos Etscheit Soap Co. v. McVey, 17 FSM R. 102, 112 (Pon. 2010), aff’d, 17 FSM R. 427, 437 (App. 2011); Nakamura v. FSM Telecomm. Corp., 17 FSM R. 41, 50 (Chk. 2010). The trial court could grant Frank Irons, as relief, the actual possession of Wisasar through an ejectment remedy, even though he did not plead ejectment. That is because, "[e]xcept as to a party against whom a judgment is entered by default, every final judgment shall grant the relief to which the party in whose favor it is rendered is entitled, even if the party has not demanded such relief in the party’s pleadings." FSM Civ. R. 54(c). Thus, even though Frank Irons did not plead an ejectment cause of action, the court could, if he proves he has a greater current possessory right to Wisasar, grant him that relief.

3. "’There is no statute of frauds - a law requiring that certain agreements or contracts to be in writing before they are enforceable in court - in Chuuk. Customarily, any agreement, even that selling land, might be oral.’" Setik v. Ruben, 17 FSM R. 465, 472 (App. 2011) (quoting Marcus v. Truk Trading Corp., 10 FSM R. 387, 389 (Chk. 2001)). Thus, the lack of any documentary evidence supporting Frank Irons’s claim that Arthur Irons orally granted Wisasar to him is not, by itself, not fatal to his claim to own Wisasar and to thus have a greater possessory interest in it than the Church.

4. Despite the use of the words "will" and "inherited," Arthur Irons’s "Deed of Will" can only be an inter vivos deed transferring, on November 3, 1992, whatever interest Arthur Irons had on that date in Wisasar (and two and a half other landholdings) to his son, Leo Irons. If it were meant to be a will, it would undoubtedly have included bequests to some or all of the other children of Arthur Irons and mention other holdings. It does not. The use of the words "will" and "inherited,"may mean that the transfer was meant to be an advance on Leo Irons’s expectancy. Or it may mean that the drafter was unfamiliar with the English words usually used to convey land interests and titles. Either way, it clearly indicates that Arthur Irons transferred to Leo Irons whatever interest he had in Wisasar on November 3, 1992.

5. "Any lease or use rights for a term not exceeding one year" does not need to be stated in the certificate of title to be effective. Chk. S.L. No. 7-04-06, § 19(1)(c). This means a leaa lease for a term greater than one year must be stated in the certificate of title. A long-term lease, such as the Church7;s, is therefore an interest in land subject to Land Commission adjudication and must be i be included on the certificate of title for it to be effective against third parties. (The longer a lease is, the more likely it is that the long-term lessee will have a greater incentive to assert or defend the lessor’s interest than the lessor, who has already been paid and to whom the land may not revert until some distant future, has.) A long-term lessee is thus entitled to notice as an interested party - as a claimant to an interest in that land - when that land is first registered.

6. Leo Irons, or his heirs, as the purported owner and lessor of Wisasar, and the Church, as the purported long-term lessee, were known (to Frank Irons, if not to the Land Commission) to claim interests in Wisasar. They were entitled, as interested parties, to actual notice of any Land Commission proceedings determining Wisasar’s ownership and other interests therein. Chk. S.L. No. 7-04-06, § 12(1)(c) rested parties muss must be served actual notice). Additionally, persons actually present on or occupying the land should, as pial interested parties, be given actual notice of any determination of ownership proceedingeding for that land. See Setik v. Ruben, 17 FSM R. 465, 474 (App. 2011) (failure to make a reasonable inquiry about the persons actually occupying the land and failure to give those occupants notice of the determination of ownership hearing made determination of ownership invalid); see also Nena v. Saimon, 19 FSM R. 317, 328 (App. 2014) (argument that someone who had occupied or used the land for a long time did not have to be given notice because they did not own the land must be rejected because the determination of who the land owners are is made at the end of the land registration process, not before it has started, and because their long-term presence on the land entitled them to notice of the land registration proceeding). It is unknown whether Leo Irons or his heirs were given any notice of the proceeding. It is certain that the Church was not given any notice.

7. It is to a land claimant’s advantage and great benefit to make sure that the Land Commission gives actual notice to everyone that the land claimant knows has or makes some sort of claim to the land that the claimant claims is his own. See Heirs of Jerry v. Heirs of Abraham, 15 FSM R. 567, 571 (App. 2008) (in a land registration system, it is in the land owner’s interest for notice to be given as broadly as possible since the certificate of title the landowner gets at the end of the process is conclusive upon any person who had notice of the proceedings and all those claiming under that person, but only prima facie evidence of ownership against all others). That is because a certificate of title, once issued, "is conclusive upon all persons who have had actual or constructive notice of the proceedings and all those claiming under them," but is otherwise only "prima facie evidence of such ownership." Chk. S.L. No. 7-04-06, § 19(1).

8. Sinee the Church was an interested party entitled to notice of the Land Commission proceedings determining the ownership of and interests in the land Wisasar and sit never received any actual or constructive notice of the the proceedings that determined that Frank Irons owned Wisasar, his certificate of title is not conclusive against the Church.

9. Even when not conclusive, a certificate of title is generally "prima facie evidence of such ownership." Chk. S.L. No. 7-04-06, § 19(1). But a ficate of titf title is ineffective against someone who was entitled to notice of the determination of ownership proceedings but did not receive any. See, ei>, Nena v. Saimon, 19 FSM R. 317, 328 (App. 2014); 14); Setik v. Ruben, 17 FSM R. 465, 474 (App. 2011); George v. Nena, 12 FSM R. 310, 316 (App. 2004); Siba v. Noah, 15 FSM R. 189, 194 (Kos. S. Ct. Tr. 2007); Heirs of Tara v. Heirs of Kurr, 14 FSM R. 521, 525 (Kos. S. Ct. Tr. 2007); Heirs of Wakap v. Heirs of Obet, 13 FSM R. 418, 420 (Kos. S. Ct. Tr. 2005); Albert v. Jim, 11 FSM R. 487, 490 (Kos. S. Ct. Tr. 2003); Enlet v. Chee Young Family Store, 9 FSM R. 563, 564-65 (Chk. S. Ct. Tr. 2000); Nena v. Heirs of Nena, 9 FSM R. 528, 530 (Kos. S. Ct. Tr. 2000). Frank Irons’s certificate of title (and underlying determination of ownership) is thus ineffective against the Church.

10. Since his certificate of title (and underlying determination of ownership) is ineffective against the Church, Frank Irons has not shown by the preponderance of the evidence that he has a current possessory interest in Wisasar superior to that of the Church. The Church has a prima facie right to the current possession of Wisasar and currently has the actual possession of Wisasar. Judgment will therefore be entered in the Church’s favor. The court takes no position on who might have the better possessory interest after the Church’s lease expires on March 15, 2020.

CONCLUSION

Accordingly, the clerk shall enter judgment for the defendant Corporation of the President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

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^[1] The court might have been able to, if the need arose, pro rate the Church’s lease amount to $400 per year and award that as damages from late 2015 or early 2016 to date.