CLEARWATER, Fla. — An Odessa man lost his legal battle against the city of St. Petersburg today after a jury ruled that two massive water mains buried under his property can remain, despite the city failing to properly record the easement for decades.
WATCH: Homeowner loses decade-long legal battle against St. Petersburg over unrecorded water pipelines
“Living through hell”
Hamid Salahutdin sued the city over a 36-inch and a 48-inch water line running under his 10-acre property off Racetrack Road.
The pipes carry a million gallons of water an hour to serve nearly 300,000 St. Petersburg residents.
The story went viral on YouTube, receiving more than 4.3 million views.
Salahutdin described the past ten years as “living through hell”.
The I-Team first interviewed Salahutdin in 2023 when he showed us what he once considered his dream home.
By that time, he described it as “worthless” after discovering a 50-foot utility easement running through his house and yard.
On Tuesday, Salahutdin testified in court about the property, which backs up to 600 acres of county-owned land.
"It was like God sent to me to move to this place,"Salahutdin said.
"It's all woods back there and I've got deer, I've got raccoons, I've got bobcats, I've got coyotes,"Salahutdin said.
However, the hidden water lines disrupted his property.
28 million gallons of water a day flow under property
Jacqueline Simms-Petredis, Salahutdin's attorney, explained the sheer volume of water moving beneath the land.
"There are 28 million gallons of water gushing through these pipes every single day," Simms-Petredis said.
Salahutdin said he learned about the pipes in 2015 when city crews came to check equipment buried on his land.
"They say it's a blow-off valve for the pipes," Salahutdin said.
A St. Petersburg Water Department supervisor then showed him the easement on a map.
"I said, that's my house," Salahutdin said. “You gotta be kidding me."
A surveyor later marked the easement with flags and stakes, and Salahutdin used pink-painted roofing shingles to show the boundaries.
"So it would stand out. So people could see it from the air," Salahutdin said.
Drone footage shows the easement slashing directly through his usable property.
"It goes through the pool, it goes through the hot tub, it goes through the screened-in, it goes through the kitchen,"Salahutdin said.
"The house and everything... it's just... it's worthless," Salahutdin said back in 2023.
“The city made a big mistake”
During the trial, Simms-Petredis argued the city made a significant error regarding the property records.
"The evidence will show you that the city made a big mistake. They failed to record an easement for over two decades," Simms-Petredis said.
The original easement was granted in 1930 but was not recorded until 1954.
During that 24-year gap, the property was split and sold multiple times, with no record of the easement.
Salahutdin testified that he used a title company when refinancing in 2007, which confirmed there were no encumbrances or easements and granted him a title insurance policy.
Title expert Penny Leite testified she searched the property records back to 1920 and discovered the land changed hands 10 times without the easement showing up on any deeds.
"The easement is simply lost in time. There was no way to find it. I did the title search myself. There's a copy of it. I did not find that easement myself either," Leite said.
Despite the unrecorded easement, St. Petersburg City Attorney Joseph Kelly argued Salahutdin should have been aware of the pipes when he bought the property.
"Had Mr. Salahuddin done even basic due diligence, it would not have been hard to find evidence that these pipes were underneath the land," Kelly said.
Salahutdin testified he bought the property directly from the former owner without an inspection or property survey.
The city's attorney also questioned Salahutdin's claim that he never saw the blow-off valve located 50 feet from his house.
Jury rules the easement can remain
After four hours of deliberation, the jury ruled that the city's easement will remain on the property.
Jurors determined that even though the easement was not properly recorded, Salahutdin failed to take action that would have revealed the city's equipment.
"Nothing has changed. 11 years I've been fighting this,it's still status quo," Salahutdin said.
When asked if he felt he received justice, Salahutdin was clear.
"No. Not at all. Not at all," Salahutdin said.
Salahutdin's legal counsel was funded through his title insurance company. He is following up with them to see if they will appeal the case.
Share Your Story with Adam
Adam Walser has spent more than a decade fighting for what’s right in Tampa Bay as part of the I-Team. He’s helped expose flaws in Florida’s eldercare system and held leaders accountable for questionable HOA practices. Reach out to Adam with any issue you think he needs to investigate.
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