Branstetter v. Poynter

• Decision Date: 26 April 1949
• Citation: 222 S.W.2d 214
• Parties: BRANSTETTER v. POYNTER.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

Page 214

222 S.W.2d 214

BRANSTETTER v. POYNTER.

Court of Appeals of Tennessee, Eastern Section.

April 26, 1949.

Certiorari Denied by Supreme Court July 9, 1949.

Appeal from Morgan County Equity Court; J. R. Ketron, Chancellor.

Suit by W. E. Branstetter against Winniedell Poynter for determination of title to land. From a decree for complainant, defendant appeals.

Affirmed and cause remanded.

J. H. McCartt, Wartburg, for appellant.

J. W. Stone, Harriman, for appellee.

HOWARD, Judge.

Complainant below, W. E. Branstetter, filed this bill against Winniedell Poynter, as defendant, to settle a dispute over the title to three tracts of land lying in Morgan County to which each of the litigants holds a deed from the same grantor.

The Chancellor, after hearing the case on oral testimony, decreed that defendant had notice of complainant's deed at the time she accepted her deed, and a decree was accordingly entered. From the adverse holding of the Chancellor, defendant appealed and has assigned errors.

Minnie B. Poynter, on the date of her death, Feb. 26, 1943, owned in fee the three tracts of land involved herein. She left surviving her a husband, C. E. Poynter, and three daughters by her husband, Winniedell Poynter, Justine Poynter Kaufman and Cleo Poynter Kratzer.

It is agreed that all the requisites necessary to vest in the husband a life tenancy by curtesy are present here, viz.: marriage, seizin of the wife, issue born alive, and death of wife; and that C. E. Poynter was vested with a life tenancy by curtesy in his wife's lands, with remainder in the three named daughters.

Subsequent to his wife's death, Poynter and his daughter, Winniedell, lived on the land until 1944 when Poynter remarried and moved away leaving the land in his daughter's possession as his agent or representative.

On April 6, 1945, Poynter executed a deed in which he purported to convey to Branstetter the three tracts of land in question, for the sum of $1150.00, to be paid as follows: $800.00 in cash and the balance to be paid upon the grantor paying the accrued back taxes. This deed was not recorded until October 24, 1945. In the meantime, on September 6, 1945, Poynter and his two daughters, for a valuable consideration, conveyed their interest in said land to Winniedell Poynter. This deed was recorded October 18, 1945, one week before Branstetter's deed was recorded.

It is insisted here that there is no material and competent evidence to support the decree of the Chancellor. In responding to this assignment, we shall refer to and quote certain portions of the testimony of complainant's witnesses.

The complainant, Branstetter, testified that Poynter delivered to him the deed to the land on April 6, 1945, in the presence of John R. Davis, former Justice of the Peace, and that he agreed to pay Poynter $1150.00 for the land; that on the date the deed was delivered he paid $800.00 in cash to the grantor, and that $350.00 was retained by him until the back taxes were paid by Poynter; that on the following day Poynter, while passing with a truck-load of furniture, gave him the key to the house and said that he was moving away; that within a few days after the deed was delivered, he had the following conversation with the defendant:

"Winniedell Poynter, and her sister, Mrs. Kaufman, I don't recall her given name presently, came in my store and asked me if I had bought their father's old home place in Deer Lodge.

"I told them that I had purchased the property, and I was standing behind the show case and they were in front of the show case, and I told her there was the deed laying in the showcase if she wanted to read it, and she got very angry when she learned her father had sold the property and said she didn't want to read the deed. She wanted to know then if she was going to get any part of the money and I told her I didn't know about that. That was between her and her father that I knew nothing of. And she made several harsh statements relative to her father and the property."

John R. Davis testified that Poynter came to his office and asked him to go to Branstetter's Store where he took Poynter's acknowledgment on the deed, and that he saw Branstetter pay Poynter some money; that he was told by both of them that it was all of the purchase price except $350.00 which Branstetter retained until the delinquent back taxes on the land were paid.

The defendant, Winniedell Poynter, admitted that she went to complainant's store in April, 1945, and that Branstetter told her that he had papers signed by her father authorizing him to sell the land. She admitted that she acquired the deed to the land from her father and sisters on September 6, 1945, and that she paid each of her sisters $500.00 for their interest therein. She further stated that before she accepted the deed from her father and sisters that the record was searched to see if there were any other deeds of record against the land. She stated that she testified in the unlawful detainer suit in which she was plaintiff against Clay Jones and wife, Stella Jones, in the Circuit Court which involved the question of possession of the land. She denied that she swore in the unlawful detainer suit that Branstetter showed her his deed to the land while she was in his store.

C. E. Poynter was called as a witness in behalf of defendant and testified he was 67 years old, and that he lived at Sunbright, Tennessee. He denied that Branstetter paid him $800.00 or any amount for his interest in the property. He admitted his signature on Branstetter's deed, and stated that John R. Davis took his acknowledgment thereto.

Dolph Arms, Deputy Warden of Brushy Mountain Prison and former sheriff of Morgan County, was called as a rebuttal witness by complainant. He testified that he was present when the unlawful detainer suit of Winniedell Poynter v. Clay Jones and wife was tried in the Circuit Court at Wartburg. This witness gave his version of defendant's testimony in the unlawful detainer suit as follows:

"Q. Did or not, she say that Branstetter told her that was a deed? A. She asked if he bought her father's place, the old home place at Deer Lodge, he said, yes, and pointed to a show case, and said there it is, do you want to read it, and she said, no. I believe you'll find that's the way she said it."

J. W. Stone, a reputable attorney of the Harriman Bar, was also called as a rebuttal witness for complainant and testified as follows:

"I represented Clay Jones and wife on trial of the case of Winniedell Poynter v. Clay Jones and wife in the Circuit Court in Morgan County, and on that trial, Winniedell Poynter testified in her own behalf, and on cross examination, being asked about it, she testified that she went to the store of Mr. Branstetter and asked him if he had bought the old home place from her father, that he said, yes, I did, and she asked him if he got a deed, and he said, yes, there it is in the show case, and that she saw the paper in the show case but she told him she didn't want to read it."

After reviewing all of the testimony, we concur with the findings of the Chancellor that the defendant had actual notice of complainant's deed prior to the time she acquired her deed, and this assignment is overruled.

In Gibson's Suits in Chancery, Fourth Edition, it says:

"No one can transfer to another a greater right to a thing than he himself possesses; and no one can, in reason and conscience, expect to acquire a greater right than the vendor could rightfully sell. He who buys with notice of another's rights is bound in good conscience to hold what he buys, subject to those rights, for otherwise he would be taking advantage of his own wrong, and would be enriching himself at another's expense, neither of which acts is permitted by a Court of Conscience. * * * Besides, a purchaser with notice has no right to complain when the third person, of whose claims he had notice, demands his own; for the purchaser was under no compulsion to buy, and * * * Any loss resulting from the prior and superior equities of the third party, the purchaser with notice must charge to his own negligence or wilfulness; for, when one of two persons must suffer a loss, he shall suffer whose own act or negligence occasioned such loss. * * * In conformity with these general doctrines, the rule is clearly established that a purchaser with notice of another's rights, in or to the thing purchased, is, in Equity, liable to the owner of those rights, to the same extent and in the same manner as the person from whom he made the purchase." Sec. 65. See Code Sections 7667, 7668; Knowles v. Masterson, 22 Tenn. 619; Stanley v. Nelson, 23 Tenn. 484; Myers v. Ross, 40 Tenn. 59; Turbeyville v. Gibson, 52 Tenn. 565; Simpkinson & Co. v. McGee, 72 Tenn. 432; Kirkpatrick v. Ward, 73 Tenn. 434; Campbell v. Home Ice Co., 126 Tenn. 524, 150 S.W. 427; Haggard v....