Malone v. Smith

PRESIDING JUSTICE COOK

delivered the opinion of the court:

This is the latest in a series of cases involving the ownership of a right-of-way of the Illinois Central Railroad (ICR), abandoned in the late 1980s. These cases have addressed section 912 of Title 43 of the United States Code (43 U.S.C. § 912 (1988)), which provides when lands of the United States are used by a railroad as a right-of-way and the right-of-way is abandoned, title shall vest in the persons to whom title of the United States was granted, “purporting to convey the whole of the legal subdivision or subdivisions traversed or…