Imler v. Yeager

• Decision Date: 04 December 1922
• Docket Number: No. 14122.,14122.
• Citation: Imler v. Yeager, 245 S.W. 200 (Mo. App. 1922)
• Parties: IMLER v. YEAGER.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

245 S.W. 200

IMLER v. YEAGER.

No. 14122.

Kansas City Court of Appeals. Missouri.

December 4, 1922.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Buchanan County; Lawrence A. Varies, Judge.

"Not to be officially published."

Action by Nina Imler against Charles Yeager. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals. Affirmed.

John E. Heffiey and W. N. Linn, both of St. Joseph, for appellant.

B. M. Lockwood and F. H. Miller, both of St. Joseph, for respondent.

TRIMBLE, P. J.

Plaintiff brought this action for actual and punitive damages, alleging that the defendant wrongfully and maliciously led a mob of armed men to her home in the night, and, awaking plaintiff and her family out of their sleep, unlawfully and wrongfully assaulted her with a shotgun and threatened to kill her; that after thus putting plaintiff in fear of her life and threatening to kill her husband, defendant compelled her husband to leave her and the children.

The answer in effect admits that defendant, in company with other men, went to plaintiff's home on the night in question, but alleges that he did so for the purpose of taking plaintiff's husband, Frank Imler, in charge and delivering him into the custody of the sheriff of Buchanan county, Mo., because defendant had been informed that said husband had ravished his (defendant's) stepdaughter; that said Imler, when informed of their purpose, submitted himself into their custody, and no force or violence of any kind was used upon said husband or any member of said household. The answer also denied any assault.

The evidence discloses that the defendant lived upon his farm some 10 miles or more south of St. Joseph and the plaintiff and her husband, Frank Imler, with their family of five small children, lived in a small tenant house in a somewhat secluded spot thereon; the said Frank Imler being employed in work on the farm. Defendant's family consisted of his wife, and a son, 27 years of age, by a former marriage, and his two stepchildren, a girl 13 and a boy about 13, children of his wife by a former marriage. The relations between the two households had been friendly, though plaintiff claims that defendant and her husband had had a heated and somewhat wordy argument over matters not connected with or involved in this controversy.

On the 14th of June, 1919, defendant was informed by a neighbor that he had been told by defendant's stepson that Imler, plaintiff's husband, had ravished his sister, the defendant's stepdaughter, on the 30th of May. Defendant did not obtain this information from either his stepdaughter or .stepson, but, acting upon what he had heard from his neighbor in that regard, and after seeing Imler in the afternoon, he, in company with his son and two other men, went to plaintiff's home at midnight. While defendant says he was not the leader in the enterprise, the evidence in plaintiff's behalf Is ample to justify the jury in believing that he organized and was in command of the expedition.

According to plaintiffs evidence, one of the men roused the family by pounding upon the door. Upon plaintiff's husband going to the door and asking who was there, he was told there that some men were there to see him, and for him to come out. Plaintiff says that defendant stationed his son, who had a gun, on the porch, and directed him to hold and watch that door. Plaintiff's husband refused to go out, and plaintiff herself, in her nightclothes, went to the door and attempted to go out to where defendant was. She was crying and begging defendant not to kill her husband. The evidence in plaintiff's behalf is, further, that upon her attempting to go out the door, defendant's son pointed his gun in a threatening manner at her, and told her with an oath to keep inside and not attempt to come out, and continued to hold the gun pointing at her, and for some time kept her from coming out on the porch. She, however, kept calling on defendant not to kill her husband, but to let him alone. The men said they were going to take him, and if he did not come out they were going in after him. The defendant also had a shotgun, and at first would not answer plaintiff when she would call his name, but finally plaintiff, crying and in great desperation and excitement, made her way out on the porch, and continued to beg defendant not to harm her husband. Defendant was very angry, and she says he cursed and swore, saying repeatedly for her to get back in the house, that it was her husband they wanted, and for the men to make him come out. Plaintiff was greatly frightened and her nerves badly shocked. Her evidence is that both defendant and his son pointed their guns at her, and for some time kept her in great fear of being shot.

Finally she recognized one of the men as a neighboring young fellow that had theretofore been a good friend of theirs, and she prevailed on him to take the guns the men had and keep watch over them; her husband agreeing if this were done he would come out of the house. The men announced that they were going to take him to the sheriff at St. Joseph upon the charge of having ravished defendant's stepdaughter. Plaintiff's husband requested them, if they were going to arrest him, to telephone for an officer, and he would willingly go with him. They would not do this, and, the guns having been secured by the young man whom plaintiff trusted, plaintiff's husband came out and was taken away; the plaintiff and her little children being left alone in the house. It seems that after defendant had taken plaintiff's husband as far as defendant's home, and had consulted with his wife, he proposed to Imler that, if the latter would immediately leave the country, defendant would allow him to go, and Imler agreed to do so. Whereupon Imler was allowed to go, and went back to his home and stayed till morning, but, being told that he had to leave, he went away; one of the men coming over and giving him money enough to go to his mother's in Kansas. In a day or so thereafter, after thinking over the events that had transpired, defendant swore out a complaint against Imler, upon which he was afterwards arrested and tried for the alleged offense against the girl, but on the trial he was acquitted by the jury. On the day of his acquittal, the defendant's stepdaughter, the girl whom defendant charged Imler with having ravished, married defendant's son.

After plaintiff's husband had left the premises, and perhaps after he had been arrested and placed in jail, the defendant and some of his men were seen hovering about the premises with guns, and plaintiff was afraid to continue...