Hurwitz

I. Introduction: This Case is About a Party Trying to Take Advantage of Its Own Wrong

This is a textbook example of a party trying to take advantage of its own wrong. In this case the opportunistic party is the City of Orange. The wrong is that the city violated a preliminary injunction not to build in a certain area or otherwise interfere with existing parking access enjoyed by a property owner. We will repeat the essence of that statement just in case any reader missed it the first time: The city violated a preliminary injunction not to interfere with the landowner’s parking access. It built a permanent cement curb that the injunction specifically precluded it from building, thereby eliminating a driveway swale and thus entirely foreclosing the owner’s access to a parking space on his property. Now the city complains because the trial court awarded the property owner damages for the loss of access.

Specifically, the city now claims on appeal that it should be immune from a condemnation award because instead of merely defending a condemnation proceeding brought by the city itself, the landowner should have also filed a proceeding in administrative mandate to . . .…