Newland v. Gentry, &C.

• Decision Date: 13 January 1858
• Citation: 57 Ky. 666
• Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals
• Parties: Newland <I>vs.</I> Gentry, &c.

57 Ky. 666

Newlandvs.

Gentry, &c.

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

January 13, 1858.

APPEAL FROM LINCOLN CIRCUIT.

Chief Justice WHEAT did not sit in this case.

Fox & Bell, for appellants —

A. A. Burton, for appellee —

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Judge SIMPSON delivered the opinion of the court.

The principal question in this case is, had the circuit court jurisdiction, on the grounds alleged by the plaintiffs in their petition, to reverse and vacate a decree previously rendered by the same court? As the decree which the plaintiffs sought to reverse had been rendered in a suit in chancery which was instituted before the adoption of the Code of Practice, it is not entirely certain that a bill brought to reverse that decree would be embraced by the Code of Practice, and it not, then no question could be made as to the sufficiency of the allegations of the petition to authorize the court to review and reverse its decree.

But conceding that the case is embraced by the provisions of the Code of Practice, we are still of the opinion the circuit court had power to reverse and vacate the decree, after the term had expired at which it was rendered.

The facts alleged in the petition establish a clear cause of fraud on the part of the complainant in the previous suit, against the rights of the plaintiffs in this action, who are infants. The complainant in that suit, instead of presenting to the court a full and fair statement of the true condition of his testator's estate, remained silent upon the subject, and merely exhibited and relied upon the will, without alleging the existence of those facts that he must have known would not only have diminished his part of the estate which belonged to the testator at the time of his death, but would have greatly increased that to which the plaintiffs were entitled; and that too, when he pretended to be acting as their guardian, and thus imposed upon himself the duty of superintending and guarding their interests. All the facts of the case conspire to prove that the decree was fraudulent, and on this ground alone, if upon no other, the court was authorized to vacate and annul it.

But the rights and interests of infants are under the special protection of courts of equity, whose duty it is to vacate every judgment and decree by which injustice has been done them. Here a decree was rendered which was manifestly unjust, not however according to the facts which appeared in the record, but according to the facts which...