Chancellor Ronald Thurman ruled Wednesday that a gate across Sunset Drive must be removed, at least temporarily.

After nearly three hours of testimony in DeKalb County Chancery Court Wednesday, in a continuation of a hearing that began on Monday, the chancellor decided that the gate erected by Robert Grant Manning in the Belk community was obstructing a county road. A temporary injunction was issued until a final hearing can be held, but Thurman also ordered a judicial settlement conference to give the involved parties a chance to settle the case without further litigation.

While the county contended that Sunset Drive is a county road, and has been on the county road map since 1998, Manning claimed that the nine-foot wide gravel road is a private driveway through his property, and has been since 1990.

Manning testified that he and his ex-wife purchased the 120-acre farm in in 1990, and that he alone had built and maintained the two driveways, Sunset Drive and Hidden Hollow Way. He said he and his ex-wife named the driveways at the request of E-911 in 1992, and placed road signs themselves as a joke, since the drive was little more than a path through his farm.

Manning said he placed a gate across Sunset Drive in the spring of 2011, when he began to have a problem with trespassers on his property. "We had one drunk come onto the property and destroy several feet of fence, and ATV riders were starting to show up. Times had changed, and we decided to gate the farm."

It was when Manning’s ex-wife sold her portion of the property to Bart Lay in 2015 that the trouble began.

When county commissioners were made aware of the gate in late 2015, the commission voted to instruct Road Supervisor Agee to take the necessary action to have the gate removed. It was taken down in January, but Manning later put it up again, this time locking it with a chain and padlock. The gate was again removed in August but has again been replaced.

Sarah Cripps and Brandon Cox, Manning’s attorneys, claimed that Manning had made no public dedication to the county of Sunset Drive, had made no dedication of right of way on the road, and that the DeKalb County Regional Planning Commission adopted the 2004 subdivision plat knowing that Sunset Drive was a private driveway.

Manning’s representation also cited deeds in which Manning reserved an easement on Sunset Drive to retain access to his property after it was subdivided, claiming that no easement would have been necessary on a county road.

Cripps and Cox also argued that there are no school bus or mail routes on Sunset Drive, and that the road leads to no property other than that of Manning and Lay, who has access to his land through 260 feet of frontage on Allen Bend Road.

Lay, however, testified that the gate has forced him to access his land through a field, and that it has caused problems in his attempts to rent a trailer and the farm land on the property.

County Attorney Hilton Conger argued that a plat signed by Manning in 2004 dedicating all streets and alleys on his property to the county, as well Manning’s 2006 signing of a deed of transfer transferring property to his ex-wife, which apparently refers to Sunset Drive as a county road was proof that Manning knew the road belonged to the county.

When Conger questioned what Manning thought he was dedicating when he signed the 2004 plat, Manning replied "the subdivision."

Thurman, while making his ruling on the temporary injunction, referred to the 2004 plat and 2006 deed Manning had signed apparently dedicating and acknowledging Sunset Drive as a county road. "Whether he intended to or not, he signed documents calling it a county road," the chancellor said.