Harper v. Adams
| Decision Date | 14 December 1925 |
| Docket Number | 25278 |
| Citation | 106 So. 354,141 Miss. 806 |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
| Parties | HARPER v. ADAMS. [*] |
(Division B.).
1. JUSTICES OF THE PEACE. Statement of cause of action may be amended after appeal to circuit court to show true amount of damage.
Where a statement of the cause of action filed in the justice court did not contain the money value of the damage incurred, but there was a judgment for less than the justice's jurisdiction on appeal to the circuit court, it is permissible to amend the statement of the cause of action so as to show the true amount of the damage. Section 558 Hemingway's Code; section. 775, Code of 1906.
2. JUSTICES OF THE PEACE. Justice of peace has jurisdiction of suits in tort occurring in his district, even if defendant is householder and freeholder of another justice of peace district which has competent justices to try cause.
Under section 2223, Hemingway's Code (section 2724, Code of 1906), fixing the venue of justice of the peace courts in civil actions, a justice of the peace has jurisdiction of suits in tort occurring in his district although the defendant be a householder and freeholder of another justice of the peace district, and there be competent justices of the peace therein to try such cause.
3. JUSTICES OF THE PEACE. "Liability" as used in statute defining venue of justice of peace courts in civil action defined.
The word "liability" as used in the above section means the state of being bound or obliged in law or justice to do pay, or make good something; legal responsibility. The state of one who is bound in law and justice to do something which may be enforced by legal action. Words and Phrases Liability.
4. JUSTICES OF THE PEACE. Estimates of value involved in suit appealed from justice of peace held not to defeat circuit court's jurisdiction on appeal, unless there was fraudulent undervaluation of property.
In the trial of a cause of action which originated in a justice of the peace court and was appealed to the circuit court, and where, on the trial in the circuit court, contradictory statements as to the value or damage involved in the suit some of which estimated the damages at more than two hundred dollars such statements will not defeat the circuit court's jurisdiction, unless there was a fraudulent undervaluation of the property or damage for the purpose of conferring jurisdiction in the justice of the peace court from which the appeal was prosecuted.
5. JUSTICES OF THE PEACE. When judgment is for same party in same amount on appeal from justice of peace court, ten per cent, damages should be added by circuit court to jury's verdict.
Where there was a judgment in the justice of the peace court for eighty-five dollars from which the defendant prosecuted an appeal to the circuit court, where there is a jury verdict and judgment, also for eighty-five dollars, ten per cent, damages should have been added by the circuit court to the verdict of the jury and included in the verdict of the circuit court. Section 66, Hemingway's Code; section 86, Code of 1906
APPEAL from circuit court of Copiah county, HON. E. J. SIMMONS, Judge.
Action by Lige Adams against Glen Harper. From a judgment in a justice of the peace court for plaintiff, defendant appealed to a circuit court. From its judgment for plaintiff, defendant appeals, and plaintiff brings a, cross-appeal. Judgment affirmed on direct appeal, and reversed and judgment entered on cross-appeal for plaintiff, with ten per cent. added damages.
Affirmed. Reversed.
M. S. McNeil, for appellant.
I. Appellee, in beginning this litigation, filed with the justice of the peace the following statement or evidence of debt: The amount claimed as damages was not shown.
Pleadings, in a court of limited jurisdiction especially, must show the jurisdictional facts. In the absence of such a showing, the justice was without jurisdiction to proceed; and the original court being without jurisdiction, of course, the circuit court on appeal could have had no jurisdiction; and the case should have been there dismissed by the court.
Appellant, in the circuit court, demurred to the claim for damages or evidence of debt on the ground that it did not show jurisdiction in the justice court. Appellee in an attempt to cure this defect, requested permission of the circuit court to amend his claim, but the record shows that such permission was never granted and the amendment, in fact was never made. So that the case comes here with the declaration, or claim for damages, still failing to show that the justice court, where the suit originated had jurisdiction.
II. The testimony in the case shows that if appellee was damaged at all by appellant, he was damaged in an amount exceeding the jurisdiction of the justice court. It is undisputed that the amount of the damage done was two hundred fifty-five dollars. In order to confer jurisdiction upon the justice court and to avoid going into the circuit court, he was willing to remit the greater part of his claim. This, without regard to his purpose or object, was, as a matter of law, a fraud upon the circuit court.
If the words "amount of the demand" in our statute are construed to mean that the litigant, himself, by fixing the amount without regard to the actual damages, may determine which court has jurisdiction, then why could he not defraud the justice court of jurisdiction and bestow jurisdiction upon the circuit court by demanding more than the jurisdictional amount of the justice court? Our court has already passed upon this question in Askew v. Askew, 49 Miss. 301.
We are familiar with the rule that where the demand is honestly made, with no intention of conferring jurisdiction upon any particular court, it determines the jurisdiction. But this is an entirely different proposition. Those cases, stating the rule just mentioned, were cases where the plaintiff really believed that the amount be claimed was the amount of the damages he sustained. They were cases where the testimony conflicted as to the amount of the damages, or the value of the property. In the instant case, however, the plaintiff, himself testifies, and it is contradicted by nobody and by no circumstances that he was damaged two hundred and fifty-five dollars and was diminishing his demand from that sum to a sum within the jurisdiction of the justice of the peace. What earthly purpose could he have had, other than, to bestow jurisdiction upon the justice of the peace?
The authorities sustain our contention that a litigant cannot knowingly and intentionally diminish the mount of his demand so as to bring it within the jurisdiction of a particular court. Fenn v. Harrington, 54 Miss. 733; Ball v. Sledge, 82 Miss. 749, at 756; Ross v. Natchez Railroad Company, 61. Miss. 12, at 15.
This, suit was filed and tried in the justice court of District No. 4, of Copiah county, while the defendant was, bad been for a number of years, and is now, a resident freeholder of District No. 5, of Copiah county. Plaintiff, upon this point, relied in the lower court upon sec. 2223, Hemingway's Code.
Our conception of this statute is that it refers only to suits ex contractu, and has no application to actions ex delicto. Our idea is that the legislature never intended that a citizen might be jerked out of his district into another justice district to defend suit, simply because the plaintiff says that under a certain state of facts happening in that particular district, the defendant was liable to him. This was an action in tort and could have as easily and conveniently been tried in District No. 5, as District No. 4. These cases are different from suits on contract, and it is more easy for a fictitious suit of this nature to be brought, and they are usually harder to defend, than suits on contracts. For this reason we believe that a man yet has a right, under this statute, to be tried in the district of his residence on suits of this character.
L. F. Easterling, for appellee.
At the conclucion of plaintiff's evidence in the court below appellant counsel moves the court to dismiss the case on the grounds that the justice court from which the case was appealed had no jurisdiction. Thereupon, counsel for appellee recalled the appellee as a witness, who testified that the injury to the mule had occurred in the justice district of Mr. Frank Toomer, the justice in whose court the suit was filed, and who tried the case.
If this is the chief ground of error relied upon by appellant, we respectfully submit that it is untenable, under section 2223, Hemingway's Code. This statute has been construed by this court in the following cases: Caine v. Simpson, 53 Miss. 521; Ellison v. Lewis, 57 Miss. 588; Hillard v. Chew, 76 Miss. 763, 25 So. 489; Williams v. Steward, 79 Miss. 46, 30 So. 1; Gibson v. Mills, 95 Miss. 726, 49 So. 568; Maltus v. Bostick Lbr. Co., 111 Miss. 883, 71 So. 16; Catlett v. Drummond, 113 Miss. 50, 74 So. 323.
The liability having been incurred in the justice district in which the suit was filed, that court had jurisdiction under the statute, even though the appellant may have, been a freeholder or a householder in another district of the same county.
It was also complained of on the motion for a new trial that the court erred in allowing counsel to amend the statement of the case sued on in the justice court. When the case was tried in the circuit court, appellant, through his attorneys, demurred to the statement of the cause of action filed in the justice court, upon which trial was had; and thereupon the appellee filed application...
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