Happy family

Find a legal form in minutes

Browse US Legal Forms’ largest database of 85k state and industry-specific legal forms.

Nuisance

Nuisance is an act, object, or practice that interferes with another’s rights or interests by being offensive, annoying, dangerous, obstructive, or unhealthful.  Such activities as obstructing a public road, polluting air and water, operating a house of prostitution, or keeping explosives are public nuisances and constitute criminal violations.  A private nuisance is an activity or condition (e.g., excessive noise, disagreeable odor) that interferes with the use and enjoyment of one’s property and that may be a cause of action in civil litigation.  An attractive nuisance is something on one’s property that poses a risk to children or others who may be attracted to it.

Adjoining land owners, who own lands that share common boundaries and therefore have mutual rights, duties, and liabilities.  The reciprocal rights and obligations of adjoining landowners existed at common law but have been modified by various state laws and court decisions.

Examples of nuisances affecting adjoining landowners include

  • the maintenance of an offensive business or conduct on one’s premises;
  • the discharge of sewage or offensive matter from one’s land onto that of an adjoining owner;
  • the escape of harmful gases or fumes from one’s premises;
  • the falling or dropping of objects or substances from one’s premises;
  • the encroachment of a structure on the land of an adjoining landowner

An adjoining landowner is owed to restraint from nuisances which might affect the property [Cecola v. Ruley, 12 S.W.3d 848 (Tex. App. Texarkana 2000)].  A landowner is liable to an adjoining landowner for injuries resulting from the improper use of one’s property. [Wiley v. Elwood, 134 Ill. 281, 25 N.E. 570 (1890); Davis v. Niagara Falls Tower Co., 171 N.Y. 336, 64 N.E. 4 (1902)].


Inside Nuisance