![]() Since then, Hill and his attorneys - University of Colorado law professor Mark Squillace and Dillon-based attorney Alexander Hood - have fought in federal court and back to state court on procedural grounds, insisting that Hill should be able to be heard in a court.Ĭolorado appeals judges in their decision wrote that “if, as Hill alleges, the relevant segment of the river was navigable at statehood, then the Warsewa defendants do not own the riverbed and would have no right to exclude him from it by threats of physical violence or prosecution for trespass.” Colorado’s attorney general at the time, Republican Cynthia Coffman, joined the case backing the landowners. Hill in 2018 filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging Warsewa and Joseph after they forced him off Arkansas River. No state laws or regulations define navigability. State officials and the landowners still could petition the Colorado Supreme Court, before March 10, seeking a review.įor years, the matter of public access to rivers periodically has reached courts, including disputes over rafting on the Gunnision and Taylor rivers in western Colorado and kayaking on the South Platte through Cheesman Gorge southwest of Denver. Supreme Court set for states in determining whether a riverbed can be private property. That’s the “navigability at statehood” test, based on whether rivers could be used commercially in their ordinary condition, that the U.S. 27 ruling says state courts must decide river access cases depending on how rivers were used in 1876 when Colorado became a state. Hill’s initial complaint alleges Joseph threw baseball-sized rocks down on him to drive him away. “It could open access to waters I am dying to fish if I live long enough.”īack in August 2012, Mark Warsewa and Linda Joseph, owners of land adjacent to the Arkansas, ordered Hill off the river as he was catch-and-release fishing about five miles downstream from Cotopaxi where Texas Creek flows in and brown trout abound along with occasional rainbows, court records show. ![]() “We’re going to get a chance to establish this as the law of Colorado – the freedom to wade in rivers, whether you fish or not, the freedom to have your feet on the bottom of a river,” he said. “I just like to get out on a clear stream and I enjoy watching the fish,” Hill said from his home in Colorado Springs, delighted at the decision in what he describes as a decade-long life mission. Colorado allows private ownership of riverbeds while all other states treat rivers deemed “navigable” as public. A three-judge panel unanimously rejected the position of Colorado’s government, which sided with landowners against Hill. This court ruling also means any other Colorado resident who has been forced off a river, from the Animas to the Yampa, can go to court to protect public access. Digital Replica Edition Home Page Close MenuĬolorado’s Court of Appeals has cleared the way for 80-year-old fisherman Roger Hill to fight for his right to fish in peace on his favorite stretch of the Arkansas River as it flows down from snow-packed mountains.
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