This case concerned whether police officers' warrantless entry into a home, prompted by a citizen report of a domestic fight, violated the Fourth Amendment and required suppression of resulting drug evidence. The court held that such a report alone does not trigger the emergency aid exception, but the entry was lawful because the officers had probable cause and faced exigent circumstances. The reasoning centered on the identified informant's tip combined with the resident's sudden, unexplained retreat inside after speaking with officers, which heightened suspicion and justified following her in, where they observed signs of assault leading to an arrest and drug discovery. The trial court's denial of the suppression motion was affirmed on these alternative grounds rather than emergency aid.
The case involved plaintiffs whose vehicle was destroyed in a collision with an uninsured motorist; after the insurer initially denied their uninsured motorist property damage claim in breach of the insurance contract, the parties litigated the vehicle's value and whether consequential damages including loss-of-use and attorney fees were recoverable. The trial court awarded $900 as the net value of the vehicle based on an appraiser's NADA guidebook valuation, plus $300 in attorney fees, but denied loss-of-use damages on the ground that plaintiffs had not rented a replacement and thus incurred no out-of-pocket expense. The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed with minor adjustment, holding that loss-of-use damages require credible evidence of actual loss that is reasonably ascertainable rather than mere inconvenience or potential rental cost, while upholding the valuation as supported by credible expert testimony and the fee award as based on actual expenditures.
This case involved post-divorce disputes between Idrees Khan and Annette Albertsen over custody and visitation of their minor child, including multiple motions for modification and orders to show cause alleging interference with visitation rights. The trial court found Khan in contempt for willfully violating the visitation provisions of the amended decree, sentenced him to 30 days in jail (suspended), and awarded Albertsen $1,000 in attorney fees. The appellate court reversed the contempt judgment and fee award. The core reasoning was that Khan lacked adequate notice of the contempt charges to satisfy due process, given the convoluted record spanning years, prior resolutions of similar charges, and findings based partly on conduct not prohibited under the decree in effect at the time.
The case involved a dispute over access to a ten-foot-wide driveway on a narrow strip of land owned by Stephen Martin, which the neighboring Kohlers claimed provided them both a private easement and public thoroughfare rights based on historical public use dating back decades. After a bench trial, the lower court ruled that the roadway had been dedicated as a public thoroughfare through continuous public use exceeding ten years, that the Kohlers held an easement over it, and that they also possessed a prescriptive easement, ordering Martin to remove a gate he had installed. On appeal, the court affirmed the finding of a public thoroughfare under Utah Code Ann. § 27-12-89, requiring removal of the gate, but reversed the easement rulings because private prescriptive rights cannot coexist with a public dedication. It also remanded for a determination of the roadway's reasonable and necessary width rather than accepting the full fenced area. The decision rested on the trial court's factual findings of long-term public access for passage, recreation, and agriculture, which Martin did not contest, while applying precedents that treat common public use as permissive and inconsistent with individual prescriptive claims.
The case involved Ron Bellonio suing Salt Lake City Corporation for injuries from a trip-and-fall accident at the Salt Lake International Airport in June 1992. Bellonio's attorneys sent letters and a notice of intent to commence legal action to the airport's insurance carrier, safety officer, attorney, director, the Utah Attorney General, and the city attorney, but not to the city's mayor or council, and a complaint was filed more than one year after the incident. The trial court denied the city's motion to dismiss for noncompliance with the notice-of-claim requirements under the Utah Governmental Immunity Act, but the appellate court reversed on interlocutory appeal. The court held that the claim was barred because the statute requires strict compliance, including filing written notice with the governing body of the political subdivision within one year, and the plaintiff's service on other officials did not meet this requirement or confer jurisdiction.
In Fink v. Miller, a homeowner in a Utah subdivision sued neighbors to enforce a recorded restrictive covenant requiring wood shingle roofs and to obtain an injunction against installation of fiberglass shingles. The trial court granted summary judgment to the defendants, holding the roofing-material restriction unenforceable, and denied a permanent injunction. The appellate court affirmed, reasoning that the covenant had been abandoned because, by the relevant time, a substantial majority of completed homes had non-wood roofs, rendering uniform enforcement inequitable while leaving other covenants intact. The court also vacated a portion of the order that purported to direct the actions of a non-party architectural committee.