ANGLICAN LAWYERS GO TO COURT FOR BETTERMENTS
On June 10, 2022, attorneys for the Anglican Diocese of South Carolina filed in the circuit court requests for betterment payments from the Episcopal Church and the Diocese of South Carolina. Find the two papers HERE and HERE .
Actually the papers were an extension of the suit the secessionists first brought for betterment reimbursements in 2017. On November 20, 2017, the ADSC filed in the circuit court "Amended Complaint." The Episcopal side asked Judge Edgar Dickson to dismiss this suit but he refused. The Anglican side's suit for betterment payments has been on the books ever since.
The new papers ask for payments from the Episcopal side for two areas, the diocese and the local parishes. In its April 20, 2022 ruling the SC Supreme Court ordered that the diocesan properties and assets belonged to the Episcopal diocese. It also ordered that 14 of the 29 parishes in question were property of the Episcopal Church and must transfer possession of the local properties to the Church.
As I understand it, the "betterments" provision of SC law allows an occupant of property, who believed he owned the property but really did not, to sue the property owner for payment for any improvements he made on the property while he thought he owned it. Find the SC law code on betterments HERE .
I am not a lawyer and am not going to try a legal analysis of this; however, I see several problems with the present betterments issue.
In the first place, in the Episcopal Church, the local parish is almost always the owner of the property, that is, the deed holder. If the parish has owned the property all along, how could it sue itself?
In the second place, the court will have to figure out when the occupants could have reasonably believed they owned the properties but really did not. Everyone knew about the Dennis Canon before, during, and after the schism of 2012. The parishes knew the church law. How could they reasonably believe they owned the property?
Moreover, the courts have gone back and forth on who owned the local properties. On Feb. 3, 2015, the circuit court ordered that all property belonged to the secessionist side. On Aug. 2, 2017, the SC Supreme Court ordered that 29 of the 36 parishes in question were property of the Episcopal Church as with the diocesan property. On June 18, 2020, the circuit court reinstated the decision of 2015 and ordered all property to the secessionists. Finally, on Apr. 20, 2022, the SCSC overruled the 2020 order and ordered 14 of the 29 parishes in question to the Episcopal side. It did the same for the diocesan properties. So, there will be a big problem deciding who owned what when. Good luck with that.
In addition, the SCSC is not through. It is still considering petitions for rehearing of 7 of the 14 in question. It may be weeks, or months, more before these are resolved.
Other than listing the 14 parishes in question, the papers of the Anglican lawyers of June 10 did not give any details. They did not give any dates on which the occupants thought they owned the properties but did not. They did not list any specific improvements any parish made. They did not give any money figure to be paid. They spoke only in generalities.
My guess is the Episcopal side will submit a motion for dismissal of these June 10 papers requesting betterment payments. If Judge Dickson rejects this and agrees to the betterments suit, he will have to face a lot of complicated issues, namely the exact dates of the possession, the actual ownership, and the specific amounts to be reimbursed for each of the fourteen. This would require a vast amount of work. Surely this would not be something any judge nearing retirement would welcome.
