John Rohan & Son Boiler Works Co. v. Young

• Decision Date: 04 May 1915
• Citation: 176 S.W. 295,190 Mo.App. 649
• Parties: JOHN ROHAN & SON BOILER WORKS COMPANY, Appellant, v. WILLIAM YOUNG, Chief of Police, Garnishee of WARREN S. HEATON, Respondent
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

176 S.W. 295

190 Mo.App. 649

JOHN ROHAN & SON BOILER WORKS COMPANY, Appellant, v. WILLIAM YOUNG, Chief of Police, Garnishee of WARREN S. HEATON, Respondent

Court of Appeals of Missouri, St. Louis

May 4, 1915

Appeal from St. Louis City Circuit Court--Hon. Irvin V. Barth Judge.

AFFIRMED.

Judgment affirmed.

Julian Laughlin for appellant.

The case was decided below on the theory that because garnishee is chief of police and therefore a municipal officer, that under Sec. 2431, R. S. 1899, he is exempted from garnishment and under no circumstances can he be subject to a garnishment proceeding. This view we think is not sustained in McGarry v. Coal Co., 93 Mo. 237; Hoker v Hennessey, 141 Mo. 527; Calumet Paper Co. v. Ptg Co., 144 Mo. 331; and appellant's motion for an order on the garnishee to deliver the defendant's property to the sheriff should have been sustained.

William E. Baird and Robert Burkham for respondent.

(1) Municipal officers are exempt from garnishment. (a) At common law: Hawthorne v. St. Louis, 11 Mo. 59; Fortune v. St. Louis, 23 Mo. 239; Connolly v. Thurber, 92 Ga. 651; Rood "Garnishment," p. 27. (b) By statute: Section 2415, R. S. 1909. (2) The Chief of Police of the Metropolitan Police Department of the city of St. Louis is a municipal officer. Section 9825, R. S. 1909; Carrington v. St. Louis, 89 Mo. 208; State ex rel. Wander v. Kimmel, 256 Mo. 611.

NORTONI, J. Reynolds, P. J., and Allen, J., concur.

OPINION

NORTONI, J.

This is a suit by attachment, and the question for immediate consideration relates to the discharge of the garnishee, William Young, chief of the Metropolitan Police Force of the city of St. Louis.

It appears from the record that one Warren S. Heaton, of Fort Worth, Texas, was the debtor of plaintiff, John Rohan & Son Boiler Works Company. On this indebtedness, plaintiff instituted a suit against Heaton by attachment and summoned William Young, chief of the Metropolitan Police Force of the city of St. Louis as garnishee, in that it is said the garnishee then held in his possession a valuable diamond belonging to Warren S. Heaton, defendant in the attachment suit. Having summoned the garnishee, plaintiff exhibited interrogatories touching his possession, etc., of the diamond. In response to such interrogatories so exhibited by plaintiff, the garnishee answered that he is chief of police of the Metropolitan Police Force of the city of St. Louis, Missouri, and that on the 18th day of January, 1912, there was arrested by his subordinates in the city of St. Louis a certain woman, said to be Louise Savine, who then had in her possession the diamond involved here; that the woman was arrested on suspicion of having stolen said stone from Warren S. Heaton, and the stone was held by him, as such chief of police, under telegraphic advices from the chief of police of the city of Fort Worth, Texas. In its reply to this answer of the garnishee, plaintiff admitted that the garnishee was such chief of police of the Metropolitan Police Force of the city of St. Louis and averred that though he held the diamond as chief of police, according to the averments of the answer, it was, nevertheless, the sole property of Warren S. Heaton and of the market value of $ 1,000, wherefore, it prayed an order that the garnishee be required to give the said diamond over into the possession of the sheriff, etc. On this reply coming in, a motion to discharge the garnishee was interposed, for that it appeared to be confessed in the pleadings he was garnished in his capacity of a municipal officer. The court sustained this motion and discharged the garnishee accordingly. It is from this order and judgment plaintiff prosecutes the appeal.

There can be no doubt that the court correctly disposed of the matter. It appears to be conceded that the diamond came into possession of the garnishee, William Young, chief of police because of his official position and that he retained it in that capacity. By the express terms of the statute (section 2415, R. S. 1909) no municipal corporation, or any officer thereof, shall be liable to be summoned as garnishee. Indeed, even long prior to the statute, it was declared, on the precepts of public policy alone, that a municipal corporation was not liable to be summoned as garnishee under the statute. [See Hawthorn v. City of St. Louis, 11...