Choquette v. Perrault

Defendants appeal from a superior court decision holding them liable to plaintiffs for a share of the cost of a division fence erected by plaintiffs between the parties’ properties pursuant to 24 V.S.A. chapter 109 (fence law). We reverse.

I

In 1970, defendants bought fifty acres of wooded and unoccupied land in Newport and cleared two acres, upon which they built their home. Four years later, plaintiffs bought a 310-acre parcel of land adjoining defendants’ property and began pasturing a herd of cattle next to an existing division fence. Despite the fence, which was apparently in a state of…