## Facts

- MCI owned a buried fiber-optic cable running across private property later owned by Wayne Hagan.
- MCI’s right to keep the cable on the property arose from an agreement with a prior owner and was not a recorded servitude or other real right.
- Hagan and James Joubert used a backhoe to clear driftwood from a boat ramp on Hagan’s land.
- During the clearing, Joubert accidentally struck and severed MCI’s underground cable.
- MCI sued Hagan and Joubert in federal court, asserting negligence and a “trespass” theory for damage to its movable property (the cable).
- MCI sought a jury instruction stating that a defendant may be liable for an inadvertent trespass to a movable caused by an intentional act (operating the backhoe); the district court refused the instruction and the jury found no liability.
- The Fifth Circuit certified to the Louisiana Supreme Court whether Louisiana law recognizes such a trespass-to-movables theory and whether the proposed instruction accurately stated Louisiana law.

## Issues

1. Whether Louisiana law recognizes an independent tort of “trespass to movables” (trespass to chattels) based on inadvertent interference with a movable resulting from an intentional act.
2. Whether a jury instruction premised on such a distinct trespass-to-movables tort is a substantially correct statement of Louisiana law.

## Decision

- The Louisiana Supreme Court answered the certified question in the negative.
- The court held Louisiana does not recognize a free-standing tort of “trespass to movables” distinct from general delictual liability under La. Civ. Code art. 2315.
- Because the requested instruction assumed a separate trespass-to-movables doctrine and did not center the analysis on fault under article 2315, it was not a substantially correct statement of Louisiana law.

## Legal Principles

- Liability for damage to movable property in Louisiana is analyzed under La. Civ. Code art. 2315 through proof of fault (intentional or negligent), causation, and damages.
- Louisiana courts generally do not import common-law nominate torts where the Civil Code’s delictual framework supplies the governing rule.
- The intentional nature of an underlying act (e.g., operating equipment) does not, by itself, establish liability for accidental damage absent fault under article 2315.
- Where a plaintiff lacks a servitude or possessory interest in land, land-based trespass remedies are unavailable; claims for physical damage to the plaintiff’s property proceed, if at all, under delictual fault principles.

## Conclusion

The Louisiana Supreme Court held that Louisiana law provides no independent cause of action for “trespass to movables”; claims for damage to chattels must be evaluated under Civil Code article 2315’s general fault-based delictual framework, making MCI’s proposed trespass instruction legally incorrect.


MCI Communications Services, Inc. v. Hagan, 74 So. 3d 1148 (La. 2011)