Farmers' & Traders' Bank v. Evans

• Decision Date: 08 January 1896
• Citation: 34 S.W. 2
• Parties: FARMERS' & TRADERS' BANK v. EVANS et al.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

34 S.W. 2

FARMERS' & TRADERS' BANK v. EVANS et al.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

January 8, 1896.

Appeal from chancery court, Sumner county; J. S. Gribble, Chancellor.

Attachment bill by the Farmers' & Traders' Bank against James M. Evans and others. From a decree of the court of chancery appeals affirming a decree sustaining the attachment, defendants appeal. Affirmed.

This is an attachment bill filed in the chancery court of Sumner county for the purpose of subjecting a storehouse and stock of groceries to the satisfaction of complainant's debt. The ground laid for the attachment was that the defendant was concealing himself so that the ordinary process of law could not be served upon him. A plea in abatement was filed by Evans, traversing the ground of attachment. The chancellor decreed that the plea was not supported by the evidence, and sustained the attachment. Defendants appealed, and the decree of the chancellor was affirmed by the court of chancery appeals. The case is now before this court upon the appeal of the defendants.

Dismukes & Seay, for appellants. S. F. Wilson and Pardue & Head, for appellee.

McALISTER, J.

The only question presented for determination is whether, upon the facts, the defendant was concealing himself so that the ordinary process of law could not be served upon him. The uniform construction of this statute (subsection 4, § 4192, Mill. & V. Code) by this court is that it contemplates a clandestine and intentional concealment, so as to avoid legal process. Bennett v. Avant, 2 Sneed, 151. The court of chancery appeals so construed the statute. That court, through Judge Barton, found the facts to be: "That the defendant Evans was doing business in the town of Gallatin as a retail grocery merchant; that he had become embarrassed, and was being pressed to some extent by his creditors; that on the 17th April, 1893, he left Gallatin, leaving the store in charge of two clerks, and telling one of his clerks that he was going to Nashville, and would be back that evening, but he remained away for some two weeks. Failing to return as promised, his wife and his nephews, becoming uneasy, came to Nashville, and, with the assistance of a detective, made an unsuccessful search for him, and, hearing no tidings, returned to Gallatin. Whereupon, on the 21st April, four days after his departure, his creditors, believing him to have absconded, sued out attachments against his property. The defendant's explanation of the matter is that he came to Nashville on business, for the purpose of seeing certain creditors and arranging matters with them. Upon reaching Nashville, he unfortunately became intoxicated to such an extent that he was utterly oblivious of all moral and social obligations, and remained in that condition for probably two weeks. It is insisted in his behalf that this temporary withdrawal and absence from his usual walks of life, without the...