Ebner v. Mackey

• Decision Date: 21 June 1900
• Citation: 186 Ill. 297,57 N.E. 834
• Parties: EBNER v. MACKEY.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

186 Ill. 297

57 N.E. 834

EBNER

v.MACKEY.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

June 21, 1900.

Appeal from appellate court, Second district.

Action by A. N. Mackey against Matilda Ebner, administratrix of the estate of Andrew Ebner, deceased. From a judgment, defendant appealed to the appellate court, and from a judgment of affirmance (87 Ill. App. 306), defendant appeals. Affirmed.

This was a claim by appellee, a physician, against the estate of Andrew Ebner, deceased, for medicial services rendered Ebner and his wife. The claim, as sworn to and lodged with the county clerk for filing, was for $370. Before claim day, $50 was paid thereon. At the trial in the circuit court before a jury on an appeal from the county court, said credit was allowed, and a verdict was rendered and judgment was entered for $320. The administratrix appealed to the appellate court. The appellate court has affirmed the judgment, and granted a certificate of importance.

Connell & Thomason, for appellant.

Geo. A. Cooke and James M. Brock, for appellee.

PER CURIAM.

In deciding this case, the appellate court delivered the following opinion:

‘Complaint is made of the rulings of the trial court in the admission and rejection of testimony. No exception was preserved to any of these rulings, and their correctness is therefore not presented to us for decision.

‘On the motion of defendant for a new trial, it was assigned as a ground for granting a new trial that the verdict was contrary to the law and the evidence. No reason is shown why the verdict is contrary to law. There was much conflicting evidence as to whether all the services charged for were rendered, and as to whether the services rendered had not been settled for by Ebner in his lifetime. The jury determined these questions for claimant, and there was evidence to support the verdict. The books of claimant were in evidence, showing charges from day to day and time to time during a period of several years, in which time, it is conceded, claimant did often attend upon the parties professionally, and especially upon Mrs. Ebner. One witness for defendant gave certain dates in the summer of 1897 between which, she testified, Ebner and wife were in Colfax, Iowa. During this period claimant's books contained several charges against deceased, and it is argued that the jury should, in any event, have disallowed those charges. The jury saw this witness, and heard her testimony. She was contradicted by the daily entries in the claimant's books. There was a shorter period, the same summer, during which the books contained no charges against deceased. Some doubt was thrown upon the correctness of the dates given by the witness by the testimony of another witness for defendant, who at two different times lived in the Ebner family, but did not live there during the summer of 1897, and yet remembered the fact of Mr. and Mrs. Ebner going to Colfax. The jury evidently concluded the witness was mistaken either as to the date or length of the stay at Colfax. We are unable to say they were wrong, or that another jury would reach a different...