United States v. Iva May Harvey, a Widow

This is an appeal by 162 individuals from a judgment ejecting them from approximately 27 acres of real property, Harvey’s Fishing Hole, and awarding the government rental value -damages for use and occupancy of this property since I960. Three issues are before us: 1) whether state rather than federal law should have been applied in the jury instruction on the question of accretion; 2) whether substantial evidence supported the jury verdict that Harvey’s Fishing Hole was formed by accretion rather than avulsion; 3) whether the United States was estopped from asserting its claim to Harvey’s Fishing Hole. We affirm the judgment below on all three issues.

I.

This is a dispute between the United States and appellants over title to 27 acres of real property located along the Colorado River in Imperial County, California. The controversy over Harvey’s Fishing Hole stems from the southerly shift of the Colorado River channel. In 1914, the United States conveyed the parcel now known as Harvey’s Fishing Hole by patent deed to Cherry Carlin. Title can be traced from Carlin to Kindred and Iva May Harvey. According to the 1914 deed, the land lay south of the Colorado River in Yuma, Arizona.…