The Line Between Two Yards

A hedge, a chainsaw, and a sign nobody read

A contractor is clearing a hedge. You think the far half of it is on your side of the line.

What a person may trim back to their own boundary, a trunk that straddles the line, local tree ordinances, easements, utility clearance work, and the separate trespass offences in the same chapter are not walked here. Nothing on this page says where a boundary runs, whether a particular cutting was reckless, or what a particular tree was worth.

A practice walkthrough, not a prediction of how any real one will go. Legal information, not legal advice.

Words this turns on

Terms with a legal meaning that is narrower than the everyday one. Each links to the definition and the authority behind it.

27 words

Acknowledgment of paternityThe affidavit a man signs to acknowledge that he is a child's natural father. Once it becomes final it is a final and enforceable determination of paternity rather than a presumption, and the form carries that warning in boldface at the top.
Administrative warrantA document issued by an agency rather than by a court. An immigration detainer and a warrant for arrest of an alien are both signed inside the agency, by an officer or a supervisor.
Apparent authorityA search is valid where officers reasonably believed the person consenting had authority over the place, even if that belief turns out to be wrong.
Attorney in factThe person a power of attorney names to act for somebody else. Under a durable power of attorney for health care, that is who decides about treatment when the principal cannot.
Co-occupant consentOne resident can consent to a search of shared space. Where a second resident is physically present and expressly objects, that objection defeats the consent as to that person.
Confirmation of saleThe court order approving a sheriff's sale. It is a separate event from the sale itself, and it is the point at which a foreclosed property stops being redeemable.
ConsentVoluntary agreement to a search, judged on the totality of the circumstances. Valid consent removes the need for a warrant and for probable cause.
CurtilageThe area immediately around a home that is treated as part of the home for Fourth Amendment purposes. A porch is the standard example.
DissolutionOne of the two ways Ohio ends a marriage. Both spouses file a petition together with a separation agreement, and not less than thirty nor more than ninety days later both appear and acknowledge under oath that they entered it voluntarily.
Equitable sharesThe basis on which adjoining owners maintain an existing partition fence. What is equitable depends on the circumstances rather than being fixed.
Exclusionary ruleEvidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment is generally inadmissible in a criminal prosecution. The case that applied the rule to the states came out of Ohio.
Exigent circumstancesAn emergency that excuses the warrant requirement, such as an immediate risk to life, a suspect in flight, or evidence about to be destroyed.
Habitual truantA child absent without legitimate excuse for thirty or more consecutive hours, forty two or more hours in a school month, or seventy two or more hours in a school year.
Home solicitation saleA sale of consumer goods or services where the seller personally solicits at the buyer's residence and the agreement is given there, or where the buyer's agreement is made at a place other than the seller's place of business. It is the category the three day right to cancel attaches to.
IncompatibilityThe most used ground for divorce in Ohio, and the only one on the list that the other spouse can remove by denying it.
IntestateDying without a valid will, so an estate is divided by the statute instead of by the person's own instructions.
Knock and announceThe requirement that officers executing a warrant announce their presence and purpose and wait a reasonable time before forcing entry. Ohio states it by statute as well.
No duty to retreatA person has no duty to retreat before using force in self defence anywhere they lawfully are, and a court or jury may not consider the possibility of retreat in deciding whether the force was justified.
Per stirpesA way of dividing an estate where a deceased person's share passes down their own line rather than being shared out among the survivors at that level.
Reasonable expectation of privacyWhether a person expected privacy in a place or thing and whether society recognises that expectation. It is the threshold question for whether something counts as a search at all.
RedemptionRecovering property before a sale is finalised by paying what the law requires, which in a foreclosure is the judgment, the costs, poundage and interest.
ReinstatementThe right of somebody who fell behind on a rental purchase agreement to put the original agreement back without losing any rights or options already acquired, where the property was surrendered when requested.
Release from administrationA probate court order letting a small estate skip full administration. The ceiling is thirty five thousand dollars in assets, or one hundred thousand where a valid will left all of them to a person named in it as the surviving spouse who survives.
Rent escrowDepositing rent with the clerk of court instead of with the landlord, where the landlord has not met the obligations the chapter sets, so the money is held until the condition is dealt with.
Shelter careWhere a child is placed after being taken into custody. A hearing on whether it is required is held promptly and not later than seventy two hours after the placement.
The self defence presumptionA person is presumed to have acted in self defence when using force against somebody unlawfully entering, or having unlawfully entered, their residence or occupied vehicle. Ohio also puts the burden on the state to disprove self defence once the issue is raised.
Without provocationThe opening words of all three dog designations. A dog has to have done what the definition describes without having been provoked into it, so provocation is not a mitigating detail added afterwards: it is part of the thing that has to be proved.