{"id":107242,"date":"2016-01-11T23:08:38","date_gmt":"2016-01-12T06:08:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cortez-mans-court-fight-over-privacy-fence-delayed\/"},"modified":"2016-01-11T23:08:38","modified_gmt":"2016-01-12T06:08:38","slug":"cortez-mans-court-fight-over-privacy-fence-delayed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cortez-mans-court-fight-over-privacy-fence-delayed\/","title":{"rendered":"Cortez man\u2019s court fight over privacy fence delayed"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Joe
Joe James points at one of his no-trespassing signs. He says that a city employee who cited him for a weed problem trespassed on his property while collecting evidence.<\/span>Courtesy photo<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Outside of City Hall, Joe James, the defendant, told The Journal that municipal officials had overstepped their duties and failed to comply with court procedures. James said, for example, prosecutors failed to provide discovery in the case until last week\u2019s scheduled trial date, Monday, Jan. 4.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe city is trying to change the rules,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

According to municipal records, the case was transferred from code enforcement officer Robert Lindvall, who initially issued a courtesy notice in regard to the pending nuisance complaint on June 10, to interim building director Sam Proffer, who closed the case on Aug. 3, after James complied with a court agreement to install a privacy fence, effectively obstructing the public\u2019s view of his backyard.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey didn\u2019t tell me how long the fence had to be up,\u201d James said last week. \u201cI didn\u2019t like it, so I took it down.\u201d<\/p>\n

After removing the fence in early September, Proffer reopened the case against James in late October, re-issuing a municipal summons for failure to comply. Last week\u2019s scheduled trial date was stayed until May 2, after James agreed to re-install the privacy fence.<\/p>\n

After the hearing, James said he planned to comply with the court\u2019s instruction, but he reiterated his irritation over city officials trespassing onto his property.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have no (expletive) business being on my property,\u201d James said.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one has complained about my property, and I\u2019ve lived there for 32 years,\u201d he continued. \u201cThe city is making a big to-do over nothing. It\u2019s not right.\u201d<\/p>\n

In late spring and early summer last year, Cortez experienced early monsoon-like conditions receiving above normal rainfall. Tall weeds were commonplace across town, in residential yards, alleyways and along city rights-of-way.<\/p>\n

After receiving the initial code violation, James purchased a half-page advertisement in The Journal as a light-hearted attempt to showcase to the community that a \u201clawn cop\u201d had trespassed onto his property.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a bully,\u201d James described Lindvall at the time. \u201cHe intimidates people.\u201d<\/p>\n

James didn\u2019t file an official complaint with the city, per se, but he did call Lindvall in June.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t threaten him,\u201d said James. \u201cI promised him that if he ever came onto my property again that I was going to whip his ass.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last week, James renewed his vow, telling The Journal that he would assault any city official that he found trespassing on his property.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the police are looking for a criminal, they come and ask me if they can go into my backyard,\u201d James said. \u201cYou don\u2019t go onto someone\u2019s property, and tell them they are the ones that (expletive) up.\u201d<\/p>\n

tbaker@the-journal.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

James points at one of his no-trespassing signs. He says that a city employee who cited him for a weed problem trespassed on his property while collecting evidence.Courtesy photo Outside of City Hall, Joe James, the defendant, told The Journal that municipal officials had overstepped their duties and failed to comply with court procedures. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":107243,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[21,318,13,525],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-107242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-cortez","tag-cortez-municipal-government","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-trials"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107242\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107242"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=107242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}