Grattan v. Mattison

• Decision Date: 19 September 1879
• Citation: 2 N.W. 432,51 Iowa 622
• Parties: O. T. GRATTAN, APPELLEE, v. S. W. MATTISON, APPELLANT.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

51 Iowa 622

2 N.W. 432

O. T. GRATTAN, APPELLEE,

v.S. W. MATTISON, APPELLANT.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Filed September 19, 1879.

Appeal from Winneshiek district court.

The plaintiff filed a petition alleging that he is the owner of certain described lands; that on or about the tenth day of May, 1873, the defendant filed, in the office of the clerk of the circuit court, a writing purporting to be a confession of judgment, made by John Lawrence and Alexander Lawrence, to the defendant herein; that upon the filing of said papers in said office the clerk of the circuit court, on the tenth day of May, 1873, entered judgment in said court in favor of the defendant, S. W. Mattison, and against the said John Lawrence and Alexander Lawrence for the sum of $700, and interest and costs; that the defendant now claims that the judgment so entered is a valid and subsisting judgment of said circuit court in his favor, for the amount aforesaid, and a valid and subsisting lien on all the real estate in petition described, prior and superior to the interest of the plaintiff therein; that the defendant has caused a writ of execution to be issued on said judgment, and the sheriff has levied on all of said lands, and has advertised them for sale on the twenty-sixth day of November, 1878; that the claim and pretence made by defendant that said judgment is a valid and subsisting judgment and lien, is a false and fraudulent pretence, and a cloud upon the title of plaintiff; that at the time of the rendition of the judgment by the said circuit court the said court had, under the then existing law, no jurisdiction or authority to enter judgments on confession; that the said court had no jurisdiction to render said judgment, for the reason that the confession or the statement accompanying the same was not verified by the oaths of John and Alexander Lawrence, and the court had no legal evidence before it that the statement had been so verified. The plaintiff prays that his title to the lands may be established; that as to him the judgment against John and Alexander Lawrence be declared fraudulent and void; that the writ of execution and the levy thereunder are void; that the defendant be barred from claiming any right to the premises; that the defendant be temporarily enjoined from making sale of said premises under the execution, and that upon the final hearing the injunction be made perpetual. Attached to the plaintiff's petition is an abstract of title, showing that his title is derived through a sheriff's sale of the premises under a judgment against John Lawrence, rendered on the eighteenth day of October, 1876.

The judge of the Winneshiek district court ordered that a temporary injunction issue as prayed, upon the filing of a bond in the sum of $500; conditions as by law...