AT&T settles land-rights suit linking Internet age with 1850s
Hundreds of Massachusetts homeowners and businesses could soon start getting $100 and $200 checks from AT&T Corp. -- but it's not an enticement to switch long-distance service.
Rather, the money is the promised payout from the settlement of a class-action lawsuit representing a clash between the ages of the Internet and the iron horse. Owners of land that was taken up to 150 years ago for construction of railroads, and more recently used by AT&T to bury high-capacity fiber-optic telecommunications cables, are being offered up to $2.20 per foot of land crossed as compensation by AT&T for failing to get their authorization to lay the cables.
Areas of the state where people may be able to make claims include Cambridge, Framingham, Southwick, West Springfield, and Worcester, and a 19-mile stretch of the former Boston & Maine Railroad from Tyngsborough to Littleton. The settlement involves land along 44.3 miles of rail lines, which could lead to a total liability for AT&T of more than $500,000. However, it is likely only a small minority of landowners will make successful claims.
The AT&T case in Massachusetts represents the latest in a string of similar suits that have been filed around the country over the last eight years, as telecom companies racing to extend their fiber networks in the most manic days of the dot-com boom rushed to lay cable along railroad rights-of-way without worrying about legal niceties.
"When they were built in the last century, typically the railroads only obtained a right to cross people's land for railroad purposes," said Nels Ackerson, a Washington plaintiffs' lawyer who brought one of the first landmark railroad-telecom lawsuits in Indiana in 1996. His firm also led the Massachusetts case.
"We know that the telecom companies knew full well that the railroads, in most instances, did not have the right to authorize the use of the right of way for fiber-optic cable, but they went ahead and did it anyway," Ackerson said. The lawsuit alleges AT&T effectively trespassed on people's land by installing the fiber cables.
Similar lawsuits are pending in several states against communications companies including MCI Corp., Sprint Corp., Level 3 Communications Inc., and Qwest Communications International Inc. Telecom subsidiaries of Norfolk Southern Corp., a major eastern US railroad, and the Virginia-based Dominion Power utility company have settled similar cases.
AT&T spokesman David Mancuso declined to comment on the case. In the past, the company has denied breaking any laws and said it would settle cases only as an alternative to costly, protracted litigation. AT&T is paying lawyers' fees as part of the settlement.
In Massachusetts, homeowners and business owners can find out whether they can make a claim at http://att.fsiwebs.net/rrcorridors/ or call 800-436-6136.
Ackerson said it could take several months before Bay State residents involved in the case get paid by AT&T. The settlement needs a formal federal court approval, due Jan. 5. Massachusetts landowners have until Feb. 14 to register claims.
People who owned land affected by the settlement but have since sold it can also file claims, but will get only a fraction of the $2.20-per-foot settlement. Also, home or business owners who want to try to bring their own suit against AT&T for damages must opt out of the settlement by Dec. 6.
Peter J. Howe can be reached at howe@globe.com.
