Bruner v. Myers
| Decision Date | 09 December 1930 |
| Docket Number | 40157 |
| Citation | 233 N.W. 505,212 Iowa 308 |
| Parties | LALLA J. BRUNER, Appellant, v. CARLOS U. MYERS et al., Appellees |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
SUPPLEMENTAL OPINION APRIL 14, 1931.
Appeal from Harrison District Court.--H. J. MANTZ, Judge.
Action in equity to set aside a conveyance. The district court dismissed plaintiff's petition and she appeals.
Reversed.
Fred E Egan and Wm. P. Welch, for appellant.
C. W Kellogg, for appellees.
Freelinghuysen W. Myers died July 31, 1912, leaving a will, the material part of which in this case was that he gave an undivided one-half of all his property to his wife, Margaret E. Myers, and the other undivided one-half was divided equally among Carlos U. Myers and Stephen A. Myers, brothers, and Lalla J. Myers, a grandchild. At the time of his death he was possessed of 540 acres of land in Harrison County, Iowa, and 480 acres in North Dakota. There was an incumbrance of $ 13,000.00 on the Iowa land and $ 1,500.00 on the North Dakota land. The two brothers divided the Iowa land, Stephen taking 200 acres and Carlos 340 acres, and the incumbrance was divided between them, Stephen assuming $ 8,000 and Carlos $ 5,000.
In February, 1923, the plaintiff herein, Lalla J. Myers, (who in the intervening time had married one Bruner) with her husband, joined in a quitclaim deed to Carlos U. Myers conveying her interest in the 340 acres taken by Carlos, and also another quitclaim deed to Stephen for the 200 acres taken by him. The action now pending is brought by the plaintiff against her father, Carlos U. Myers, to set aside the aforesaid quitclaim deed made in his favor on the ground that the same was procured through fraud. While Stephen Myers is made a party defendant by order of court, no attack is made upon the deed made to him, the action being directed wholly to a cancelling or setting aside of the quitclaim deed made to Carlos U. Myers.
It is quite unnecessary to set out the evidence in the case, but we will content ourselves with the conclusions we reach deducible therefrom.
The plaintiff here was a young woman, inexperienced in business and business methods, who by her grandfather's will was entitled to an undivided one-sixth of all of the property which he left. Defendant, Carlos, testifies that this consisted of the aforesaid 540 acres of Iowa and 480 acres of North Dakota land. From the time of the grandfather's death in 1912 to the time of the making of this deed, the plaintiff received nothing whatever in the way of rents or profits from any of this land, although the Iowa land at least had been occupied all of this time by her father and her uncle. Sometime in 1922, Carlos commenced to negotiate with the daughter for her one-sixth interest in this property, and proposed to trade her what is known in the record as the "Chambers land", consisting of 160 acres of Missouri River bottom land in Harrison County for her interest in her grandfather's estate. He testifies that he figured her share in the estate to be of the value of about $ 11,000.00. The Chambers land was incumbered by two mortgages, a first mortgage of $ 12,000.00 and a second mortgage of $ 14,000.00, making a total of $ 26,000.00. For the equity in the Chambers land, the father traded to Chambers the equity in the North Dakota land which he says was figured in at $ 10,000.00, and the title to the Chambers land was made to the plaintiff. In addition to this equity in the Chambers land, the father and the uncle each paid to the plaintiff $ 500 in cash, also paid two debts against the grandfather's estate amounting to about $ 1,600.00. The father made payment of his $ 500 by furnishing seed and planting the Chambers farm for the plaintiff, and Stephen paid his $ 500 in cash.
Carlos represented to his daughter that the equity in the Chambers land was worth $ 10,000.00, and that, plus the $ 1,000.00 amounted to $ 11,000.00, which he says was her share in the grandfather's estate. She testifies that she never knew the value of her interest in her grandfather's estate except as told to her by her father; that she never looked at the Chambers land before the deed was made, and that her father importuned her many times before she finally consented to make this deal; that she hesitated about making it because she thought it too heavy a burden to assume, but her father persisted until she finally took his advice and made the deal. She asserts that her father told her if she would take this land he would help her and see that she would not lose...
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