Legal Question in Civil Litigation in Minnesota

The situation summarized: My father-in-law's sister lived in the original 100 year-old farm house on a half-acre while my father-in-law sold her his share of the house and then ended up building up the farm and building his own house on the surrounding 11 acre farm site. So she had her house and 1/2 acre in the middle of his land and about 80yds away from his house. Needless to say, she ended up hoarding for the last 27 years and 16 years ago they were able to get the county in to remove 6 dumpsters worth of garbage only. But the real issue is that 10 weeks ago her house actually exploded, but didn't burn, and caused extensive damage to his buildings, house, and spread garbage, feces, and asbestos materials all over. The latter made it impossible to have someone clean it up and his sister, that lived, also refused to get things moving on cleanup until the county gave her an ordinance. So 8 weeks after the explosion she was supposed to have cleanup completed or the county was going to find someone because it was supposed to be done by the 14th and of course she received extensions prior to that. But during cleanup, she and 3 of her friends continued to hinder cleanup by sifting through garbage and hazardous waste and two weeks later now they are not close to done. The company that filled her LP tank has taken the initiative to pay for the clean up costs, though the only thing they are guilty of is not doing a pressure test, supposedly, while the real culprit was the human/animal urine that ate through the copper pipes due to her hoarding. So this whole situation has caused renewed emotional distress on both of my in-laws because this hazardous waste/garbage has been blowing all over thier farmsite for two months now and they were told that all the damaged buildings and vegetation, would be removed and the large hole filled in. But apparently, she is going to be able to retain her damaged garage so she will be able to continue to store hoarded materials in there, which she has already done because the "hazmat workers" already cleaned out all the garbage, became sick the next day, and she has since refilled it with her found materials that include orange juice that was exposed to the elements and asbestos for two months.

So after all of that, are there any grounds of pulic endangerment, gross negligence, negligent discharge, that he could use as leverage so that he can find a way to get her off the property because this is a recurring headache that is very stressful for our entire family. Or even just to get the damaged garage removed so that she can't continue to hoard out there? We are just looking for options because the County hasn't followed up with their mandates in this case or the case 16 years ago when she was supposed to receive counseling that she avoided.


Asked on 10/20/11, 4:11 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys

Daniel Reiff Reiff Law Office

There are several remedies your father-in-law has. A few that come to mind right away are trespass and nuisance. I recommend retaining a real estate attorney to go through all the facts and advise more fully.

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Answered on 10/20/11, 4:40 pm


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