Timber Piracy, Statutory Interpretation, and Legislative Intent: The Louisiana Supreme Court’s Decision in Sullivan v. Wallace

Mirais Holden, Loyola University School of Law - New Orleans

Abstract

The Louisiana legislature imposes punitive treble damages on timber pirates, those who cut or remove timber from land belonging to another. For many years in Louisiana, it was unclear whether those same treble penalties applied to co-owners of land who sell timber of which they only own a part, without the consent of their fellow co-owners, in a blatant attempt to steal the full profit for themselves. In a historical circuit split, one Louisiana circuit held that the treble damage statute did apply to timber-pirating co-owners, while another Louisiana circuit held that it did not. The author of this case note argues that when the Louisiana Supreme Court addressed the circuit split in Sullivan v. Wallace, the Court came to an unjust result in deciding that the treble damage statute did not apply to timber-pirating co-owners. Instead of using the available reasoning adopted by the dissent, which comported with the applicable rules of statutory interpretation, the majority leaned too heavily on the principle of strict interpretation of punitive statutes and passed the issue off to the legislature. The majority's decision in Sullivan v. Wallace largely ignores the environmental and other policy issues at stake in the case and also has unjust implications for plaintiff co-owners.