WYOMING — On Monday, Oct. 20, the U.S. Supreme Court made a decision declining to hear a prominent corner-crossing case that has been in and out of the courts since 2021.
As previously reported by Buckrail, the case stems from an incident in 2020 when four Missouri hunters crossed over the airspace where four square pieces of property meet — to step from one public plot to another — while avoiding touching the other two properties, which are privately owned. The private-property owner brought a civil case against the hunters, alleging $7 million in damages if he lost exclusive access to the “locked” public land.
This practice of corner crossing has been a flashpoint for decades due to the historic nature of western land tracts being laid out in a checkerboard pattern, causing over 8 million acres of public land to be inaccessible to the public across the West.
On Monday morning, the Supreme Court released a document which included all the cases it will and will not hear in the future. It listed the corner-crossing case, “Iron Bar Holdings, LLC v. Cape, Bradly H., et al.,” under the list of cases that were denied a review.
Advocates for Multi-Use of Public Lands (AMPL) Executive Director Will Mook told Buckrail that he has been watching the case closely as an avid outdoorsman, even though Teton County does not have this checkerboard pattern locally. He said the decision is a huge win for the American people, especially hunters and anglers who don’t rely on trail systems to recreate.
“And it just makes sense,” Mook said. “It seems crazy to me that you can’t step from one corner of public to another corner of public.”
This issue is very nuanced, Mook explained, and it is extremely important for users to know exactly what their plan is when corner crossing. He said that handheld GPS devices are not accurate enough on their own, and that recreationists should know where to find the surveyed corners of the property lines.
“Those hunters in Carbon County had done a ton of research … and made every effort possible to not damage the private property,” Mook said. “We also have to respect private property rights and ownership. It is still very nuanced, but as a concept, I’m really happy that we’re taking some of the ambiguity out of it. I do want people to be responsible.”
The practice of corner crossing will remain legal in the states served by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals: Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Utah and Wyoming.
