Coyle v. Ward
| Decision Date | 04 June 1901 |
| Parties | COYLE v. WARD et al. |
| Court | New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from supreme court, appellate division, First department.
Action by Ellen M. A. Coyle against William D. Ward and others. From a judgment dismissing the complaint on the merits, on an order of the appellate division (55 N. Y. Supp. 388) affirming an interlocutory judgment of the special term overruling demurrers to defenses contained in the answer, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.
Gibson Putzel and Edward W. S. Johnston, for appellant.
Charles Haldane, Thomas Allison, Johm J. O'Brien, and Johm F. Ward, for respondents.
The only question in this case arises upon an appeal from the order overruling the defendants' demurrer to certain separate and partial defenses interposed to the defendants' answer. The plaintiff and the two defendants are the three children and sole heirs at law of one Edward Ward, who died on the 9th of November, 1897. The purpose of this action, as appears from the complaint, was to annul and set aside three written instruments purported to have been executed by the deceased, and from the allegations of the pleadings may be described as follows: (1) Two instruments purporting to be deeds or conveyances of all the real estate that the deceased then had, and which is specifically described in the complaint, one dated May 2, 1895, and the other June 11, 1895, which were duly recorded. The complaint does not state that these deeds purported to cover different parcels of land, but the fair inference from the general allegations is that they both conveyed the same land, being all the land that the deceased owned. The inference is permissible, from the very general language of the complaint, that one deed followed the other, and that both cover the same property. It was alleged that these conveyances were procured by the defendants from the deceased by means of a fraudulent conspiracy on the part of the grantees to defraud deceased and deprive him of his property, and that they were the result of fraud or undue influence practiced by the defendants upon the deceased. (2) The last will and testament of the deceased, dated June 21, 1895, a copy of which is attached to the complaint. The relief demanded was that the deeds described and the will referred to be declared null and void. The defendants' answer, among other things, interposed, as a separate defense to so much of the cause of action stated in the complaint as related to the deed of May 2, 1895, a former judgment upon the merits recovered by the defendants against the deceased in his lifetime, and entered about June 20, 1897. The pleadings in this action, with the decision and the findings of the referee, were referred to and made a part of the answer, and attached thereto. That was plainly an action by the deceased in his lifetime to set aside the deed of May 2, 1895, on the same grounds stated in the complaint in the case at bar, and the decision was in favor of the defendants. These facts were also interposed as a further, separate, and distinct defense to so much of the cause of action stated in the complaint as was embraced within certain paragraphs therein stated. This separate defense differs only from the one above described in the circumstance that, from its terms, it may be construed as a separate defense to both deeds and the introductory matter preceding the principal allegation. The pleader then states that for a further, separate, and partial defense to the entire complaint the defendants allege the same facts in regard to the former suit above stated.
The plaintiff demurred separately to each of the defenses separately stated in the answer, and based upon the former suit and judgment, on the ground that in law they were upon their face...
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