United States Tenth Circuit

In a dispute concerning the legal status of claims by local government to rights of way for the construction of highways across federal lands, the case is remanded to determine whether the road work undertaken by defendant-Counties constituted a trespass.

Appellate Information

• Decided 09/09/2005
• Published 09/09/2005

Judges

• McCONNELL, Circuit Judge., Before HENRY, HARTZ, and McCONNELL, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Tenth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Mark L. Shurtleff, Utah Attorney General, and J. Mark Ward, Assistant Attorney General, Salt Lake City, UT;  Steven W. Strack, Deputy Idaho Attorney General, Boise, ID;  and Patrick J. Crank, Wyoming Attorney General, Cheyenne, WY, filed an amici curiae brief for the states of Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming, in support of Appellants San Juan, Kane, and Garfield Counties.


• For Appellees:
  
• Shawn T. Welch (Robert S. Thompson, III, with him on the briefs), Pruitt Gushee, Salt Lake City, UT, for Defendants-Appellants San Juan County and San Juan County Commissioner Tyler Lewis., Ralph L. Finlayson, Assistant Attorney General (Mark L. Shurtleff, Attorney General, with him on the briefs), Salt Lake City, UT, for Defendants-Appellants Kane and Garfield Counties., Jerome L. Epstein, Jenner & Block LLP, Washington, D.C. (Heidi J. McIntosh, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, Salt Lake City, UT, Edward B. Zukoski, Earthjustice, Denver, CO, and William H. Hohengarten, Jenner & Block LLP, Washington, D.C., with him on the brief), for Plaintiffs-Appellees Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance and Sierra Club., Todd S. Aagaard, Attorney, Appellate Section, Environment & Natural Resources Division, Department of Justice, Washington, D.C. (Thomas L. Sansonetti, Assistant Attorney General, M. Alice Thurston, Attorney, Appellate Section, Environment & Natural Resources Division, Department of Justice, Washington, D.C., Paul M. Warner, United States Attorney, Salt Lake City, UT, and Daniel D. Price, Assistant United States Attorney, Salt Lake City, UT, with him on the brief), for Defendant-Appellee Bureau of Land Management., Michael S. Freeman, Faegre & Benson LLP, Denver, CO, filed an amici curiae brief for Property Owners for Sensible Roads Policy and Jana and Ron Smith, in support of Appellees Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, Sierra Club, and the Bureau of Land Management., Rebecca L. Bernard, Trustees for Alaska, Anchorage, AK, and Louis R. Cohen, James R. Wrathall, and Brian M. Boynton, Wilmer, Cutler, Pickering, Hale & Dorn LLP, Washington, D.C., filed an amici curiae brief for Natural Resources Defense Council, National Parks Conservation Association, The Wilderness Society, Alaska Center for the Environment, Alaska Wilderness League, Arizona Wilderness Coalition, California Wilderness Coalition, Colorado Environmental Coalition, Colorado Mountain Club, Grand Canyon Trust, Greater Yellowstone Coalition, Idaho Conservation League, National Wildlife Federation, National Wildlife Refugee Association, New Mexico Wilderness Alliance, Northern Alaska Environmental Center, San Juan Citizens Coalition, Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, and Wyoming Outdoor Council, in support of Plaintiff-Appellees.