Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with trespassing

How can I find out who wrongly gardened my garden?

gavtaylor — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 09:33:28 -0800

When I was away on vacation, someone trimmed the front hedge, seriously pruned the lemon tree and the lime tree, and trimmed my soap lily down to nothing! Help me to find out why (we didn't hire a gardener), and maybe get my lemons back! I think a gardener must have been hired to work on someones yard and ended up at the wrong house. None of my immediate neighbors saw anything.

The trimmings are all in our green refuse garbage can, but there must have been 50 lemons on our tree that are now gone! We usually juice them and make frozen lemonade concentrate this time of year. The lemon tree is about half of what it used to be.

I am a little angry about this (and a bit befuddled and awed), our front hedge didn't need to be trimmed and the blossoms on it are all gone. And the chlorogalum is practically gone! During the daytime it closes up and may have looked dead to the gardener. You might think we should be happy about the free gardening, but it was really unnecessary and made our yard less attractive.

Would you file a police report? I suppose I should take photos, too. What course of action might I take to find out who did this?

Rape records from early US history

billtron — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 10:26:06 -0800

Where can I find antebellum white-on-black rape statistics? How would you go about finding such things, given that slaves were considered property and, consequently, rape was charged, if ever, as trespassing on the owner's private property. Do archives exist in which criminal justice records from before 1865 would provide evidence that such crimes took place?

Is leaning trespassing?

youthenrage — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 23:29:26 -0800

Am I trespassing if I am standing on a public sidewalk, leaning against a wall that directly abuts the sidewalk? Me and a friend were just stopped by a police officer who accused us of trespassing. He made us show him our ID, ran our information and threatened to arrest us for trespassing. Our crime? Stopping on a public sidewalk and leaning against a wall that directly abuts the sidewalk for about 15 minutes.

Quick Summary - Me and a friend were walking around, we stopped on the sidewalk and wait around for some friends. We both stood on the sidewalk and leaned up against the wall. We were not obstructing anybody else on the sidewalk, it is wide enough for people to walk by unhindered by us. After about 15 minutes we decided not to wait any longer and left. A police officer stopped us about 100 ft. away and asked to see our IDs. I asked him if we were being detained, and if so, what we were being detained for. He said that we were being detained, for trespassing. I asked where we were trespassing and he said we were sitting on "his wall". I said that we weren't on the wall, but standing on the sidewalk. He said that this was still trespassing, and demanded our IDs. We provided them, he ran our information and when it came up that we didn't have any warrants, he let us go warning that we could be arrested for trespassing if we came back.

To be totally clear, this is DEFINITELY a public sidewalk, and a public street. There are no "No Trespassing" or "Private Property" signs anywhere in the immediate area. The wall starts immediately where the sidewalk stops (it's not like sidewalk, strip of grass, wall - just sidewalk, wall). The street/sidewalk runs through a public university and the officer worked for that university - not the city.

I think this cop was being ridiculous, the wall physically prevented us from trespassing, the definition of trespassing says that you must enter the property and it's pretty clear that we didn't enter it.

Can anybody confirm or deny whether leaning on or touching a wall/building is trespassing? The only source I could find was this "Sitting against a building is not trespassing
This is one we hear about a lot. People leaning up against a building are told they are trespassing and are asked to move along. Nothing could be further from the truth; it is a physiological impossibility to be "on" or "in" a building that one is leaning against, even if there is some commingling of subatomic particles. " which I got from The Street Spirit. This happened in Richmond, VA.

Questions on Law in printing Urbex book on sites without permission

grahamux — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 12:50:21 -0800

Some friends and I are into Urban Exploration. We're photographers who enjoy this subject quite a bit. We've been considering writing a book of pictures and a few stories of various sites we have done. I am curious if anyone knows the legal ramifications of publishing such a book? The idea is there would be pictures of sites we did not have permission to photograph. These are sites where 'no trespassing' signs have been clearly posted and alternative measures have been used to gain entrance. Note:: No breaking and entering or burgulary methods were used. Available entrances only. This question is on the legality of publishing said book, please no flames or discussion on the legal issues surrounding urbex itself. Thanks in advance.

Public grounds arbitrarily closed?

bryanboyer — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 17:17:33 -0800

Can a public building arbitrarily declare its grounds closed on the weekends and not accept any public visitors? (Talking about the Diamond Ranch High School in Pomona, CA specifically) On New Years day my girlfriend and I, both grad students in architecture, decided to drive down to Ponoma, CA to take a look at Morphosis' famous Diamond Ranch High School. Visitors from the east coast, and then having driven an hour south from Los Angeles specifically to see this project, you can imagine our surprise when a rent-a-cop greeted us at the top of the drive way. The building, he said, was closed and we had to leave.

The rentacop called the real cops (and, incidentally, lied to them by telling them that we "ran onto campus," presumably to ensure that the cops actually showed up) who arrived to instruct us that since it's a "closed campus" all visitors must get permission from the school board first. You'd think that a school which is well known to the architecture community, ensuring many archi-tourist visitors a year and also appearing in multiple movies would at least have some mention of visitation procedures on their website...

Mind you, we never asked to go inside the building. We only wanted to walk around the exterior.

If it's a public building (Pomona Unified School District) paid for with public money, is it legal to just close it off like that?

IMHO, IANAL AOKAY.

coolhappysteve — Sun, 23 Dec 2007 22:23:50 -0800

LegalFilter: My foolish friend received a misdemeanor in CA for trespassing and apparently needs to be booked and appear in court. She's set to fly to NY for school in three weeks - is she allowed to leave the state? Imprecise and non-legal advice are welcome if you're up front about it. This is more of a "WTF do I do?" point in the situation than any sort of legal action she's taking.

(If you're curious, she scaled cliffs and climbed through a barbed-wire fence here for kicks.)

How to discourage trespassing neighbors?

lucky mollusk — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 23:16:57 -0800

How do I discourage neighbors from trespassing in my courtyard? My roommate and I rent a 3BR with a courtyard in Cambridge, MA. There is an adjacent house, owned by the same landlords, with two units, each of which has a fire escape through the courtyard. The first-floor unit has a door opening directly onto the courtyard, the second-floor unit has a circular staircase outside a window. Both of these units have separate main entrances.

We were told verbally before leasing the apartment that the courtyard would be exclusively ours, and not shared with the other units. This was significant to us, as there is very little privacy between the courtyard and our living space. This is not, however, explicit in our lease (I know -- we screwed up here).

New tenants recently moved into the first floor apartment. They thought the courtyard was to be shared (possibly based on an agreement between the previous tenants of their unit and the previous tenants of our unit). We, of course, thought otherwise. We asked the landlords for clarification, and they reiterated (via email) that the courtyard could be used for "emergency fire egress" by residents of the other units, but otherwise was part of our rental. The new first floor tenants have seen this email, but continue to use the courtyard. We are not pleased.

I'm interested in any advice on how to accomplish the following, in order of descending importance:

1st: Convince the new tenants of the adjacent unit to respect our privacy and stay out of our home,

2nd: Not annoy our landlords (or, say, the police),

a distant 3rd: Not upset the neighbors any more than we have to. At this point, we're unlikely to become friends, but I'd rather not make enemies. Although if that's the way it has to be, at least my next question should be more entertaining...

Tenant rights - was this trespassing?

othersomethings — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 13:27:20 -0800

My apartment was entered without the knowledge or consent of me, or my landlord. Is this trespassing? I live in an condo unit that is privately owned. The condo below me is privately owned. Some of the condos are owned by the building, etc. but many like mine, are privately owned and rented out. Recently the owner of the unit below mine has complained of water damage, and though she tried negotiating with my landlord to assess the situation, she ALSO went through the property management (who, once again, doesn't own my unit) and filed complaints.

Long story short...the unit owner below, along with someone from the property management, and a plumber went into our unit and did inspections of the bathrooms - ALL without my knowledge or consent. I was not informed that anyone would be entering my unit. ALSO my landlord did not know that the property management had a key to my unit.

Have any rights been violated, and should I (and my landlord) be concerned on any level?

I really couldn't find any information on this...Google only came up with tenants who ARE trespassing, and askmi came up with "am I liable for injuries of someone trespassing."

Keep Out!

cocoagirl — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 10:48:05 -0800

How to keep trespassers off our city property while maintaining a neighborly feel? For the fifth time in about a year, we've noticed trespassers on our property. Three of those occasions have been after dark, and were 1-3 young men at a time (late 20s, early 30s, not kids of neighbors). One was a middle-aged woman nosing around at dusk behind the most set-back structure on the lot. The fifth resulted in some outdoor stuff stolen. Usually we confront these people and they say, "Oh, I just thought there was a way through to such-n-such street" and we tell them there isn't, it's private property and please leave. We have called the police for two of these instances, but the trespassers had moved on by the time they arrived. Also, I assume if we've noticed five instances, that there probably have been more.

It is clearly a private house, but we are in a very urban area with a large & curious (or tempting) property line. Except for the driveway itself, the entire perimeter has a 4' fence, but primarily for looks and property line demarcation, not as a response to vandalism or theft. We currently have a wireless beeper signaling entrance on the driveway, motion detector lights, a deer cam on the "back 40" that we can't see from the house, and a very strong house alarm. I'm now considering a driveway gate, though I don't like the feel that creates in what is a very friendly neighborhood. Suggestions? What else should we/could we be doing to reduce the trespassing?

Signs, signs, everywhere a sign...

zhivota — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 10:10:26 -0800

POSTED / NO TRESPASSING - Has this always been the norm? When did it become popular for virtually *everyone* to do this to their land? How serious are people, in your experience? Also, is there anywhere where they don't do this (as much)? I spent all yesterday mountain biking through my very rural local area. It is hilly, to the point where are are long stretches of hillside that are unfarmable. During the course of my trip I went by numerous POSTED signs (although I didn't actually violate them, I kept going until I got to a non POSTED place). My problem is that much of this POSTED land was not being farmed, or used in any other way at all. It was just deemed "private" by some person who decided (s)he doesn't want anyone else on his land.

Basically, this practice has been really getting my goat lately. It feels like there is no land which has not been claimed and staked and is not jealously gaurded from everyone else, even though I live in a very rural area.

When did it start that everyone posted their land? Is it the mass popularity of hunting and ATV's? I could see not wanting gunshots and loud motors on my property.

Has anyone here actually been caught violating a POSTED sign, for doing something benign, like hiking or biking? What happened? Did you actually get prosecuted?

Lastly, does anyone here live somewhere that this isn't so common? I'm thinking places like the Northern/Western US, or rural Canada as possibilities. Is it just a pipe dream?

Need permission for farm photo?

cgs — Wed, 21 Dec 2005 08:50:02 -0800

Should I ask the farmer's permission before taking pictures on his field? hi- i've long wanted to take some photos on some fields in my hometown in PA. i envision parking the car, hopping the fence, taking the shots (10 min), and getting out of there without messing with anything. do you think i'd better hunt down the farmer (or his family) and ask permission first, or just do it? on the one hand, it is trespassing, on the other, i'm just shooting landscapes (no people, equipment or houses), and maybe he wouldn't want to be hassled?

Is it still possible to walk the High Line?

tweebiscuit — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 14:48:33 -0800

Is it still possible to walk The High Line? I know Kottke did it, but I haven't found any more recent accounts anywhere, and I'm concerned that since the High Line has attracted more attention (and federal funding) recently, they may be taking stronger steps to prevent trespassing. Will my trip be ruined? Also, if anyone can recommend an entrance, that would be fantastic. I know that I could just wait a year for it to be a public park, but I love urban ruins, so I very much want to see it before it's cleaned up.

Posted: Question about, er, posting.

eschatfische — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 19:34:46 -0800

Why do signs to deter trespassers use the convention "Posted: No Trespassing" when the very fact that such a sign is physically posted makes the use of the word "Posted" redundant? I do realize that in some locations, the verbiage of the signs are mandated by law -- but that doesn't explain why the use of the term posted *would* be law, when it's self-evident that a posted sign is... posted.