O'Connor v. Solomon
| Decision Date | 28 January 1926 |
| Parties | O'CONNOR v. SOLOMON ET AL. |
| Court | Connecticut Supreme Court |
Appeal from Superior Court, Hartford County; George E. Hinman Judge.
Action by Vivian M. O'Connor to recover damages for injuries caused by alleged wrongful levy of execution on her property against Annie Solomon and others. Judgment for defendants and plaintiff appeals. No error.
Vivian M. O'Connor, pro se.
Frederick B. Hungerford, of New Britain, for appellees.
The appellant, plaintiff in the court below, both there and here has herself prosecuted the case, although she is wholly without training or experience in legal procedure. A party who, unskilled in such matters, seeks to remedy some claimed wrong by invoking processes which are, at best, technical and complicated, is very ill advised, and assumes a most difficult task.
Our courts, however, have always been lenient toward such an one relaxing the rules wherever it can be done with propriety, and the record before us is replete with evidence that every reasonable assistance was given to the plaintiff in her efforts to present her case for trial and to prepare it for presentation to this court. We cannot, of course, entirely disregard the established rules of procedure, adherence to which is necessary that parties may know their rights; that the real issues in controversy may be presented and determined; and that the business of the courts may be carried on with reasonable dispatch. But we do not, as we might, dismiss this appeal out of hand, with the comment that the record before us does not properly present any question of law which we could review. Rather, out of consideration for the plaintiff's youth and inexperience, we search the record to see if we can find any reasonable grounds upon which an appeal may be predicated.
The underlying facts seem not to be greatly disputed. In October 1922, the William F. O'Connor Company, Inc., owned and operated a drug store on Hartford avenue in New Britain, dispensing various commodities therein at retail. On October 18, 1922, the company sold this store in its entirety, with its fixtures and contents, to the plaintiff, under such circumstances as to bring the sale within the purview of section 4749 of the General Statutes, and it then gave her a bill of sale covering the transaction. No notice of an intention to make the sale, as provided in that statute, was filed, and the bill of sale was not recorded until November 21, 1923. On November 9, 1923, the present defendants Benjamin and Annie Solomon recovered in the city court of New Britain three judgments, two against the W. F. O'Connor Company, Inc., and one against that company and the plaintiff, and on December 3, 1923, executions upon these judgments were issued and given to the defendant Carlson, a deputy sheriff, to serve. On December 5, 1923, he made demand upon the judgment debtors, and, payment being refused, he went to another drug store operated by the plaintiff, and there found two wall fixtures, a glass show case, and a set of scales which had been in the drug store on Hartford Avenue when it was sold to the plaintiff and which had been included in the sale. These articles, after a considerable controversy with the plaintiff, and her uncle and adviser, Wm. F. O'Connor, the defendant Carlson took under his execution, and later sold. Section 4749 of the General Statutes requires that any person who makes it his business to buy commodities and sell them in small quantities for the purpose of making a profit, and who proposes to sell, not in the regular course of business, the whole or a large part of his stock in trade or fixtures, shall cause a notice of his intention to make the sale to be recorded in the town clerk's office not less than 14, nor more than 30, days before it is to be made, and the statute goes on to provide that any sale made in violation of that requirement shall be void as against any creditor, unless the instrument of sale has itself been filed for record in the town clerk's office at least 14 days. In Austin, Nichols & Co. v. Gilman, 100 Conn. 81, 123 A. 32, we construed this statute with reference to the method of calculating the 14-day period allowed as the shortest time before a sale for the filing of a notice of intention, and held that the day of recording the notice was to be disregarded and an attachment made by a creditor on the fourteenth day thereafter was good as against the rights of the vendee. The same rule would, of course, apply in calculating the 14-day period which must elapse after the recording of an instrument of sale before the rights of creditors would be barred. Here the bill of sale was recorded on November 21, 1923, and the levy of execution was made on December 5, 1923. The property was, therefore, subject to...
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...and determined. See Hartford National Bank & Trust Co. v. DiFazio, 177 Conn. 34, 39n, 411 A.2d 8 (1979); O'Connor v. Solomon, 103 Conn. 744, 745-46, 131 A. 736 (1926). "It is a well-settled principle of law that a party to a civil action may appear either pro se or through counsel. See 7 Am......
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