A dispute over golf balls from a driving range landing in a homeowner's yard has reached the Indiana Supreme Court.
Mitchell Schultz claims up to 1,500 golf balls have landed on his property annually since 2018. He and his attorneys argued in court Thursday in front of Indiana Supreme Court justices, according to a report by indianacapitalchronicle.com. The story says lawyers for Sandy Pines Golf Club, located in DeMotte, Indiana, also argued their side.
The case could lead the Sandy Pines to raise the netting around the driving range or perhaps even close the range altogether.
Schultz is mostly fighting to stop golfers from trespassing in his yard to fetch their wayward golf balls. An earlier trial "found the golf course liable for trespass but
assigned Schultz 95 percent of the fault because he acquired ownership of the property knowing golf balls were landing there," according to the report.
Later, in the Indiana Court of Appeals, the case was overturned. Now, it's arrived in the state's highest court.
The year 2018 is key to this dispute because that's when Sandy Pines built a driving range at its course, which was right next to land that Schutlz and his family have owned for more than 50 years. Schultz then documented broken windows and golf balls going into his pool. Sandy Pines responded by switching to limited-flight golf balls at the range. But that didn't slow the stray balls.
Thursday's arguments centered around whether "Sandy Pines can be held responsible for golf balls struck by its customers, rather than by the business itself," according to the story.
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Dispute over driving range golf balls landing in neighbor's yard reaches Indiana Supreme Court
