2018 New Mexico Statutes
Chapter 30 - Criminal Offenses
Article 14 - Trespass
Section 30-14-6 - No trespassing notice; sign contents; posting; requirement; prescribing a penalty for wrongful posting of public lands.
A. The owner, lessee or person lawfully in possession of real property in New Mexico, except property owned by the state or federal government, desiring to prevent trespass or entry onto the real property shall post notices parallel to and along the exterior boundaries of the property to be posted, at each roadway or other way of access in conspicuous places, and if the property is not fenced, such notices shall be posted every five hundred feet along the exterior boundaries of such land.
B. The notices posted shall prohibit all persons from trespassing or entering upon the property, without permission of the owner, lessee, person in lawful possession or his agent. The notices shall:
(1) be printed legibly in English;
(2) be at least one hundred forty-four square inches in size;
(3) contain the name and address of the person under whose authority the property is posted or the name and address of the person who is authorized to grant permission to enter the property;
(4) be placed at each roadway or apparent way of access onto the property, in addition to the posting of the boundaries; and
(5) where applicable, state any specific prohibition that the posting is directed against, such as "no trespassing," "no hunting," "no fishing," "no digging" or any other specific prohibition.
C. Any person who posts public lands contrary to state or federal law or regualtion [regulation] is guilty of a petty misdemeanor.
History: 1953 Comp., § 40A-14-7, enacted by Laws 1969, ch. 195, § 2; 1979, ch. 186, § 3.
Bracketed material. — The bracketed material was inserted by the compiler and is not part of the law.
Failure to post notices not a valid defense to liability for trespass at common law. — Where plaintiffs filed a complaint against defendants seeking injunctive relief and damages arising from claims for common law trespass based on allegations that defendants performed certain earthwork on plaintiffs' land, the district court did not err in denying defendants' jury instruction modeled on the text of the criminal trespass statute, 30-14-16 NMSA 1978, which imposed a duty on landowners to post notices on the boundaries of their property in order to subject individuals to trespass liability for any entries thereon, because this section cannot be fairly read to change the common law of trespass, which does not require posting of property in order for an unauthorized entry to constitute a trespass. Holcomb v. Rodriguez, 2016-NMCA-075, cert. denied.
