“Brandy, you served me with a $2 million lawsuit claiming my property was a public menace,” I replied, keeping my voice deadpan. “You claimed I was destroying the environment. You tried to force a distress sale. You made it very clear that we are at war. Well, guess what? You don’t get to sue me into oblivion and then drive heavy machinery over my lawn.” “I’m calling the police,” she screamed, pulling out her phone.
“Please do.” I smiled. Two sheriff’s deputies arrived 20 minutes later. Brandy immediately launched into a hysterical tirade, claiming I was violating emergency access protocols and attempting to extort the neighborhood. The older deputy, a weathered man named Sergeant Miller, listened patiently before turning to me. I calmly handed him David Higgins’s certified state survey map, the county plat records, and the deed to my property. Then I handed him a copy of the lawsuit Brandy’s lawyer, Robin Boyer, had filed against me.
Sergeant Miller reviewed the documents, looked at the neon orange stakes poking out of the snow, and sighed. He turned back to Brandy. “Ma’am, Mr. Russell has clearly established his property lines,” Miller said, his tone authoritative. “This gate is on his land. Furthermore, since your own legal counsel has initiated a civil suit regarding this property, this is strictly a civil matter. I cannot force him to open the gate.” “They will freeze to death,” Brandy shrieked. “Then I suggest they buy some space heaters and extremely warm blankets,” Miller said flatly. “If you or your security guards attempt to breach this gate, I will arrest you for trespassing. Have a good day, folks.”
By nightfall, the temperature dropped to 5°. The panic in Whispering Pines was palpable. I could see the glow of their massive windows up on the cliffside, but I knew the heat was bleeding out of those glass palaces by the second. Without propane, their radiant floor heating failed. Their pool boilers shut down, leaving tens of thousands of gallons of water exposed to the freezing air. The heated driveways turned into sheer, impassable sheets of black ice.
The next morning, Robin Boyer made his move. He filed an emergency ex parte motion in county court begging a judge to grant a temporary restraining order that would force me to open the road on the grounds of humanitarian emergency and prescriptive easement rights. I represented myself at the emergency hearing. Boyer, wearing a suit that probably cost more than my car, stood before Judge Harrison and painted me as a greedy, vindictive monster who was extorting innocent families.
When it was my turn, I didn’t argue the morality. I argued the law. “Your Honor,” I said, holding up Boyer’s original lawsuit. “Mr. Boyer and his clients initiated legal action against me two weeks ago. In their own filing, they claim my depot and the surrounding land are subject to their HOA bylaws. They claim jurisdiction over the parcel. But you cannot claim prescriptive easement, which requires acknowledging the land belongs to someone else, while simultaneously suing the owner under the pretense that the HOA controls the land.”
Judge Harrison, a no-nonsense jurist with a reputation for punishing frivolous litigation, peered over his glasses at Boyer. “Counselor, did you or did you not attempt to force a distress sale of Mr. Russell’s property?” Boyer cleared his throat, suddenly looking very uncomfortable. “Your Honor, that was a preliminary protective measure regarding—” “Save it,” Judge Harrison snapped. “You tried to bully a schoolteacher out of his legal property, and you failed to do basic due diligence on your client’s infrastructure. You cannot use the courts as a weapon to terrorize this man and then come crying to the courts for an emergency bailout when your intimidation tactics backfire. You have unclean hands, Mr. Boyer. Motion for emergency injunction denied. This will go to a standard civil trial. Next available docket date is February 14th.”