## Facts

- Lacy Investment Corporation held record title to a larger tract that included a rear parcel located behind Halpern’s residential lot.
- Halpern bought the adjoining residential lot in 1959 and built a residence in 1960.
- The Halperns wanted the rear parcel to be part of their backyard and offered to buy it from Lacy’s predecessor in title; the offer was refused.
- Despite knowing they did not own the rear parcel, the Halperns caused it to be bulldozed and cleared, incorporated it into their yard, and used it continuously thereafter.
- Halpern sued claiming title to the rear parcel by adverse possession.
- Lacy denied adverse possession and asserted counterclaims for slander of title, trespass, and litigation expenses (including attorney fees).
- A jury found against Halpern on adverse possession and found for Lacy on its counterclaims; the trial court entered judgment on the verdict.

## Issues

1. Whether Georgia adverse possession requires a claim of right made in good faith, or whether hostile possession alone satisfies the claim-of-right requirement.
2. Whether the trial court erred by refusing to instruct that hostile possession is the legal equivalent of a claim of right.
3. Whether alleged evidentiary and related errors concerning attorney fees and Lacy’s counterclaims required reversal.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed.
- The court held the jury was properly instructed that adverse possession requires possession accompanied by a good-faith claim of right.
- The court approved the refusal to charge that hostile possession is automatically the legal equivalent of a claim of right.
- The court rejected Halpern’s remaining assertions of error, leaving intact the verdict for Lacy on slander of title, trespass, and litigation expenses.

## Legal Principles

- To acquire prescriptive title by adverse possession in Georgia, the claimant must prove possession under a claim of right made in good faith.
- Hostile acts inconsistent with the true owner’s title may support an inference, and in appropriate cases a rebuttable presumption, of a good-faith claim of right.
- Mere hostile occupation, without an honest claim of right, does not satisfy the claim-of-right element.
- Entry and continued occupation with knowledge of lack of ownership constitutes trespass, and trespass cannot mature into prescriptive title.

## Conclusion

The court upheld a verdict rejecting adverse possession where the claimant knowingly took and used another’s land after an unsuccessful attempt to purchase it, holding that Georgia law requires a good-faith claim of right and does not allow knowing trespass to ripen into prescriptive title.


Halpern v. Lacy Invs. Corp., 259 Ga. 264, 379 S.E.2d 519 (1989)