Anderson v. Goodman

• Citation: 172 N.E.2d 257,341 Mass. 704
• Parties: Edward M. ANDERSON, individually and as trustee, v. Milton B. GOODMAN.
• Decision Date: 03 February 1961
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

Page 257

172 N.E.2d 257

341 Mass. 704

Edward M. ANDERSON, individually and as trustee, v. Milton B. GOODMAN.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

Argued Nov. 10, 1960.

Decided Feb. 3, 1961.

Israel Bernstein, Boston, for respondent.

Walter N. Kernan, Boston, for petitioner.

Before WILKINS, C. J., and SPALDING, WILLIAMS, WHITTEMORE and CUTTER, JJ.

WILKINS, Chief Justice.

This is a petition to vacate a judgment entered in the Municipal Court of the City of Boston in an action of contract for the balance due on a promissory note against the petitioner, individually and as trustee. In the Municipal Court the petition was denied, and the petitioner appealed to the Superior Court.

A petition to vacate judgment must be brought in the court in which was entered the judgment sought to be vacated. G.L. (Ter.Ed.) c. 250, § 15. As the present petition was filed in the Municipal Court of the City of Boston by requirement of statute, the present appeal lay to the Superior Court. Town of Hopkinton v. B. F. Sturtevant Co., 285 Mass. 272, 275, 189 N.E. 107. See Lynn Gas & Electric Co. v. Creditors' Nat. Clearing House, 235 Mass. 114, 115, 126 N.E. 364. The case was to 'be there tried and determined as if originally commenced there.' G.L. (Ter.Ed.) c. 231, § 97.

In the Superior Court the following order was entered: 'After hearing petition allowed. Judgment vacated, default removed upon the filing of a sufficient surety company bond in the sum of one hundred dollars * * * within ten days.' The judge denied six requests for rulings of the respondent. The respondent filed a claim of exceptions stating that he 'excepts to the finding of the court entered on April 13, 1959, allowing the petition to vacate judgment and removing the default upon the filing of sufficient surety bond in the sum of $100 within ten days.' He also excepted to the denial of his requests.

The exception to the finding raises no question of law. See Fox v. Bottomly, Mass., 172 N.E.2d 255. ¹ The granting of the petition 'rests largely although not exclusively in the sound discretion of the court.' Russell v. Foley, 278 Mass. 145, 148, 179 N.E. 619, and cases cited. There was sufficient evidence to satisfy the requirement that the petitioner must have a meritorious defence worthy of a trial in court. Herlihy v. Kane, 310 Mass. 457, 460, 38 N.E.2d 620. The judge could have based such a finding upon the pendency of a suit in equity in the Superior Court brought by the petitioner against the respondent, Ward Rayfield, and others involving the subject matter of the case at bar, in which an injunction was issued and outstanding. The judge needed to look no further than the respondent's answer filed in the Superior Court on July 7, 1958, where he alleged 'that levy was made on the real estate attachments, but sale was continued because the petitioner brought a bill in equity alleging to the equity court that he could not defend this action in the law court or get the law court to give him any relief as the law court was barred by G.L. c. 231, § 31, petitioner making election to defend in equity court, and as a result his only defence, if any, would be in equity court. That the equity court took jurisdiction and issued a restraining order allowing levy to be made in [sic] the execution, but suspended sale of said parcels until the bill in equity be decided in said court.'

Much of the argument in the respondent's brief is too sketchy to deserve more than brief disposition. He argues only two requests by number. The first request ² resembles a request for a finding of fact. If treated as somehow a request for a ruling of law, it is a request for a ruling contrary to what we have hereinbefore said, and could not have been granted. The second request, ³ by way of contrast with the first, seems to ask a ruling that the defence to the original action must be certain of success. Hyde Park Sav. Bank v. Davankoskas, 298 Mass. 421, 422, 11 N.E.2d 3. Compare Mellet v. Swan, 269 Mass. 173, 177, 168 N.E. 732.

The third and fifth requests to the effect that the judge would not be warranted in finding that the petitioner had a good defence or any defence, respectively, present no new question. The fourth request based in part upon 'Ignorance of the petitioner or his counsel in failing to appear at the trial of the original action' assumes facts which the judge would not have been warranted in finding. The only testimony was that no notice of marking for trial had been sent the petitioner. Nor is ignorance a bar as matter of law. See Manzi v. Carlson, 278 Mass. 267, 273-274, 180 N.E. 134; Kravetz v. Lipofsky, 294 Mass. 80, 85, 200 N.E. 865. The sixth request is unintelligible, and does not appear to be argued. The requests were all rightly denied.

The only exception as to which the respondent's argument consists of more than one or two sentences relates to an exception to what the respondent contends was a ruling by the judge during the cross-examination of the lawyer who had represented the petitioner in the original action. The colloquy was as follows: 'Q. There wasn't any question or issue as...