Graffam v. Burgess

• Decision Date: 01 March 1886
• Citation: 29 L.Ed. 839,6 S.Ct. 686,117 U.S. 180
• Parties: GRAFFAM and another v. BURGESS. 1 Filed
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

6 S.Ct. 686

117 U.S. 180

29 L.Ed. 839

GRAFFAM and another v. BURGESS.¹

Filed March 1, 1886.

A. A. Ranney and N. L. Graffam, for appellants.

John Lowell, for appellee.

BRADLEY, J.

This was a bill in equity filed on the tenth of July, 1880, by Christine J. Burgess, the appellee, against Peter Graffam, Samuel M. Fairfield, Edward B. Newhall, and others, to compel Graffam to deliver up to her certain lands and premises unlawfully held by him, (as alleged,) and for other and further relief. The bill alleged that the complainant had for many years been the owner in fee-simple of the premises in question, a house and lot in the town of Melrose, Middlesex county, Massachusetts, unincumbered, and worth at least $10,000; that complainant generally occupied the property as a summer residence, and, when not occupying it herself, rented it out to tenants with the furniture therein; and that her general residence was with her husband, in Providence, Rhode Island. It was further alleged that in the fall of 1877 the complainant had some mason work done by Peter Graffam, one of the defendants, the bill for which was $23; that the complainant objected to paying the bill on the ground that the work was badly done; that in January, 1879, Graffam employed Samuel M. Fairfield, an attorney, one of the defendants, to sue the complainant for this bill, by attachment, in the Middlesex district court, and that on the tenth of March, 1879, he recovered judgment against her for $28.95 damages and $16.15 costs; that execution was issued on this judgment, and the whole property was sold by the sheriff, at his office in Malden, on the seventeenth of May, 1879, and that Graffam became the purchaser for $73.10, and the sheriff gave him a deed; that inJanuary, 1879, Edward B. Newhall, a real estate agent, pretending to have a claim of $30 against the complainant for services, employed Fairfield to sue the same, and an attachment was issued, and judgment recovered on the same tenth of March, 1879, and execution issued and levied on the interest of complainant remaining in the premises after the sale to Graffam; and that a sale was made of said interest to Newhall on the thirteenth of August, 1879, for $81.21, and a deed was given to him by the sheriff accordingly. The complainant alleges that neither of these claims was valid against her, and that the parties knew it; that when the levies and sales were made the complainant had $3,000 worth of furniture and personal property in the house entirely unincumbered, and had a well-known agent in the neighborhood, and a tenant in the house until June 1, 1879, after which she occupied it herself until the fall; that she also had an attorney in Massachusetts known to the defendants, but that no notice of such sale was ever communicated to her, her attorney, agent, or tenant; that in 1880, from and after the first of May, the complainant expended $1,200 in repairs to the house and grounds; that Graffam and the other defendants meanwhile conspired together to keep her in ignorance of the sale until the year allowed by the statutes of Massachusetts for redeeming the property had expired; that in pursuance of this scheme Graffam bought out Newhall, who, by his subsequent purchase, had a right to redeem the property from the sale to Graffam; that the year for redemption having expired on the seventeenth of May, 1880, on the twenty-second of June thereafter, Graffam, Fairfield, and others, during the temporary absence of the complainant from the house, seized their opportunity, entered upon the premises, broke into the house, and took possession of it in behalf of Graffam, removed all the furniture and other personal property, including the wearing apparel of complainant, of her husband and servant, took possession of her private correspondence and papers, and the sum of $170 in money, and still held possession of all of said property at the time of filing the bill; that complaninant, on being informed of this proceeding, immediately caused an investigation to be made, and for the first time learned of the sales made under the executions; that she thereupon entered into negotiation with Graffam to try to get a settlement, and offered to pay him all that the property had been sold for, and such reasonable costs and charges as he had sustained; but that he refused any arrangement unless she would pay him $1,100, which he claimed was due him by reason of the large sums he had expended to employ counsel and men to watch and advise him of the complainant's absence, so that he could take possession. The bill states that Graffam still had keepers in possession of of the house, who were injuring it by their wanton conduct, and that the complainant was informed that Graffam intended to sell the property, and was soliciting offers for it. An answer under oath was waived. On the sixteenth of June, 1880, an amendment to the bill was filed, alleging that Graffam, to carry out his fraud, had conveyed the property to one Herbert F. Doble for the nominal consideration of $5,000, and stated several circumstances to show that it was not a bona fide transaction. The deed was dated before the filing of the bill, but it was charged that it was not executed till afterwards, and that the date was a false one. Doble was made a party.

The defendants severally answered, but as the answers were not required to be under oath, it is unnecessary to recite them. The parties went into proofs, and the cause was heard before the court below, which, in January, 1882, announced its opinion that the case was one for redemption, but not for entire annulment of proceedings and unconditional surrender of the property on account of fraud; therefore, dismissing the bill against all the defendants except Graffam and Doble, the court gave the complainant leave to amend her bill on payment to the defendants of costs and reasonable counsel fees. The complainant amended her bill accordingly by adding an offer to pay into court the amount of the two judgments recovered against her by Graffam and Newhall, with interest, and praying for permission to redeem the property, and that Graffam and Doble might be required to account for rents and profits, and to reconvey to her. This amendment was first objected to, and then demurred to; but objections and demurrer being overruled, the defendants filed an answer, setting up that the application to redeem came too late, and that no sufficient offer was made to entitle complainant to redeem; that defendants were entitled to $2,000 for expenses, etc. The complainant paid into court the defendants' costs, $215.45, a counsel fee of $150 allowed by the court, and $181.24, the amount of the two judgments and sates under the same, with interest. Thereupon the court made a decree, dated April 21, 1882, whereby, after reciting the payment of the money into court by the complainant, and that the defendants, Graffam and Doble, had collected certain rents and made certain payments, and had made charges for services, and for the custody and care of the premises; and that these accounts and items had been submitted directly to the court without reference to a master, and the court having found and declared that the defendants, Graffam and Doble, were sufficiently paid by the rents received by them for all said charges and expenses,—it was then decreed as follows, namely: 'That the complainant is entitled to redeem the premises without further payments for such redemption; that the said defendants, Graffam and Doble are eftitled to receive the sums already paid into court for their benefit, and to retain the rents received by them; and that the said defendants, Graffam and Doble, make converyance of the real estate described in the bill to the complainant, free from all incumbrances made or suffered by or through them.' It was also referred to a master to determine the form of conveyance to be made pursuant to the decree, to receive said conveyance duly executed, and to deliver the same to the complainant, and report proceedings. The master reported the form of a deed, which was approved, and the defendants were ordered to execute it. From this decree the defendants, Graffam and Doble, have appealed.

We do not propose to review the evidence in the case in detail. We have carefully examined it, and find the principal allegations of the bill to be true, and are convinced that while the complainant was apprised of the suits of Graffam and Newhall instituted against her by attachment, in her absence, in January, 1879, and employed counsel to defend them, yet that she was totally ignorant of the issue of executions on the judgments in those cases, and of the sale of her property under the same, and of the legal rights which Graffam acquired, or might acquire, by the laps of a year's time after the sale. We are satisfied that she was unconscious of the position in which her property stood, and that Graffam knew that she was unconscious of it, and endeavored to keep her so, and took an inequitable advantage of her ignorance to get possession of her property, and to get her in his power. Even if it be true, as the court below supposed, that the evidence was insufficient to make out a case of conspiracy and fraud that would sustain a decree for unconditional delivery of the property as originally prayed, we think it is abundantly sufficient to justify the decree which the court below did make, allowing the complainant to redeem upon payment of debt, interest, costs, and counsel fees. In our judgment of the case the defendants ought to be well satisfied with this disposition of the case.

It is a principle of law, as well as of natural justice, that greater consideration and care are due to persons known to be unable to take care of themselves than to those who are fully able to do so. The driver of a team, seeing a child or a woman, or a person of known feeble intellect, in the street, is bound to exercise greater care and...