Harrison Drury secures possession orders for two clients impacted by trespassers
The property litigation team at Harrison Drury has recently secured back-to-back possession orders and writs of possession for two clients who fell victim to trespass on their land by persons unknown.
On separate occasions, but in almost identical circumstances, members of the travelling community entered upon a business park site owned by building supplies company C & W Berry and another owned by property developer Tustin Developments Limited.
The trespassers refused to leave the premises when asked to do so by the respective land owners and immediately posed a risk to the operation of the businesses based on each site.
For instance, deliveries of stock to those businesses were restricted due to the positioning of the caravans, motorhomes and other vehicles across the sites. It was therefore imperative that possession of the sites be handed back to the clients and the sites be secured accordingly.
Severe disprution prevented
On both matters, Harrison Drury arranged for possession proceedings to be issued by the court and process served on the trespassers within 12 hours of instruction from the clients.
Hearings for the relevant claims for possession were listed by the court within 48 hours of service of the proceedings. Our team secured the relevant orders for possession and subsequent writs to enlist the services of High Court Enforcement Officers to attend at the sites and evict the trespassers.
On one of the matters, the eviction took place late on Friday evening, with the writ being secured out of hours from an on call High Court judge.
Gary Higham, finance director at C & W Berry, explains: “We own a commercial property with 25 business tenants and the disruption it would have caused for those business owners had we not acted quickly would have been severe.
“Fortunately for us, Harrison Drury knew inside-out both the law and court procedures around trespass and securing possession and they were on it straightaway. Luke and his team pulled out all the stops to ensure that, within a matter of hours, we had the both the possession order and writ to be able to instruct High Court Enforcement Officers and evict the trespassers.”
Andrew Roberts, managing director of Tustin Developments, shares a similar story about the trespass incident at one of their premises.
Andrew said: “The trespassers had blocked off the loading bays of six units at one of our sites, which had the potential to severely disrupt the operations for four separate tenant businesses.
“We’re incredibly thankful to Harrison Drury for how quickly they managed to resolve what was a testing situation. Harrison Drury’s team showed a deep level of professionalism and diligence, guiding and reassuring us throughout the process, and ultimately getting the trespassers off our land and allowing normal operations to resume.”
Acting swiftly
Luke Holden, associate solicitor at Harrison Drury, led on both matters with the assistance of trainee solicitors, Jessica Woodman and Lucy Parkhouse.
Luke said: “Our property litigation team have a wealth of experience in securing possession of commercial premises for clients when travellers and/or other trespassers have taken up unlawful occupation of their land.
“As proven in both of these cases, we can ensure that the claim for possession is filed into court and put before a judge promptly and secure the necessary order for possession so that trespassers can be evicted within days of them unlawfully occupying the land.
“Instructions such as these are extremely time sensitive and swift action is always required. It’s therefore important to have a strong grasp of the procedural requirements to secure possession promptly, sometimes during out of hours as we successfully achieved on one of these cases”.
Should you require any assistance in removing trespassers from your land, please do not hesitate to e-mail Luke Holden or call him on 01772 258321, so that assistance can be provided as early as possible.