## Facts

- Frank Partipilo and Elmer J. Hallman owned adjoining parcels in Chicago.
- The Cook County assessor mistakenly assessed certain improvements located on Hallman’s property (a building, portions of a driveway, and a fence) as if they were on Partipilo’s parcel.
- For tax years 1977–1979, the error caused Partipilo’s parcel to be overassessed and Hallman’s parcel to be underassessed by $26,467.10.
- Partipilo paid the full real estate taxes assessed against his parcel, including the amount attributable to improvements actually on Hallman’s land.
- After the mistake was discovered, Partipilo sued Hallman seeking $26,467.10 on an unjust-enrichment theory, arguing he had effectively paid Hallman’s tax obligation.

## Issues

1. Whether a property owner who mistakenly pays real estate taxes attributable to an adjoining owner’s improvements may recover that amount from the adjoining owner under unjust enrichment.
2. Whether Restatement of Restitution § 43 (payment discharging another’s duty or releasing a lien under mistake) supports restitution in the context of a tax-assessment error.
3. Whether the statutory tax protest/refund framework displaces a private restitution action between neighboring landowners for an assessor’s misassessment.

## Decision

- The appellate court reversed the summary judgment entered for Partipilo and remanded.
- The court held that unjust enrichment did not permit Partipilo to recover the overpaid taxes from Hallman on these facts.
- The court concluded that the proper avenue for relief from an erroneous assessment and resulting overpayment lies in the statutory procedures directed at the taxing authorities, not a private restitution claim against a neighbor who did not cause the assessment error.

## Legal Principles

- In Illinois, unjust enrichment is an action at law for money recovery and requires a legally recognized basis for treating the defendant’s retention of a benefit as unjust; a net benefit alone is insufficient.
- Restatement-based restitution principles, including payment of another’s duty under mistake, are applied consistently with governing statutory schemes; courts are reluctant to create parallel private remedies that bypass legislatively prescribed tax remedies.
- A statutory tax obligation and tax lien arise from public law and run to the taxing authority; payment of taxes under an erroneous assessment does not, without more, create a restitutionary duty running from an underassessed neighbor to the overassessed taxpayer.
- Where the overcharge is attributable to governmental assessment error, the typical remedy is through tax objection, protest, or refund mechanisms against the taxing body rather than reallocating tax burdens via private quasi-contract.

## Conclusion

The court rejected a neighbor-to-neighbor unjust-enrichment claim for real estate taxes overpaid because of an assessor’s mistake, reasoning that restitution doctrine cannot be used to reassign tax burdens outside the statutory system designed to correct tax assessment and payment errors.


Partipilo v. Hallman, 156 Ill. App. 3d 806 (Ill. App. Ct. 1987)