Johnston v. Meaghr

• Decision Date: 15 February 1897
• Docket Number: 726
• Citation: 47 P. 861,14 Utah 426
• Court: Utah Supreme Court
• Parties: ANNIE JOHNSTON ET AL., APPELLANTS, v. WILLIAM MEAGHR ET AL., RESPONDENTS

47 P. 861

14 Utah 426

ANNIE JOHNSTON ET AL., APPELLANTS, v. WILLIAM MEAGHR ET AL., RESPONDENTS

No. 726

Supreme Court of Utah

February 15, 1897

Appeal from the Second district court, Box Elder county. Hon. C. H Hart, Judge.

Action by Annie Johnston and another against William Meaghr and others for malicious prosecution and false imprisonment. Judgment for defendants. Plaintiffs appeal.

On June 25, 1894, the respondent, William H. Rowe, was the receiver of the Bear Lake & River Irrigation & Canal Company, and on that day the respondent Meaghr was his foreman, in charge of a gang of men and teams engaged in constructing a lateral canal, near Point Lookout, in Box Elder county, upon and through some land which the appellants claimed to be the owners and were in the possession of, and the appellants, on said day, by certain acts and threats and the exhibition of an unloaded Winchester rifle, a pistol and a prod-pole attempted to and did, in fact, compel Meaghr, his men and teams, to cease the construction of the said lateral canal and the plaintiff, Annie Johnston, upon said occasion beat and prod the horses used in the work with the pole, in the end of which was a sharp steel prod, and both appellants threatened to shoot Meaghr.

After the perpetration of these acts and threats by the appellants Meaghr reported the same to Mr. Rowe, who instructed him and another of his employes, one Jarvis by name, to lay the facts before the prosecuting attorney of Box Elder county.

As a result plaintiffs were taken before a justice of the peace and required to give bonds, each in the sum of $ 200, to keep the peace.

The plaintiffs, failing to give the bond, were, by the respondent Holmgreen as justice of the peace, committed to the custody of the respondent Loveland as sheriff of said county, and the commitment was received in evidence, and the sheriff took the plaintiffs to the county jail of Box Elder county at Brigham City and placed them therein, in the custody of his deputy and jailer, the respondent Baird; and on the second day of July, 1894, the appellants executed and filed their bond of security to keep the peace, and were thereupon immediately released from custody.

On the 18th day of October, 1894, the proceedings instituted before the respondent Holmgreen, as justice, were dismissed by an order of the Fourth judicial district court.

Reversed.

R. H. Jones, for appellants.

Where, as in this case, "but one detention is complained of, the party plaintiff may allege in his petition and prove on the trial such facts as show either a cause of action for false imprisonment or one for malicious prosecution or both." 14 Am. Encyc., p. 17, n. 1., citing, Buer v. Clay, 8 Kan. 580; Neil v. Thorn, 88 N.Y. 270; Marks v. Townsend, 97 N.Y. 590; Barr v. Shaw, 10 Hun (N.Y.) 580; Bradner v. Faulkner, 93 N.Y. 515; Wagstaff v. Schippel, 27 Kan. 450; 7 Am. Encyc. p. 687; n. 1. citing, A. T. Ry. Co. v. Reese, 36 Kan. 593.

The court erred in allowing Justice Holmgreen to testify that he acted in the capacity of justice. It was a question of law. Vaughn v. Gordon, 28 Am. Dec. 759; Gurmon v. Raymond, 6 Am. Dec. 202; Tracy v. Williams, 10 Am. Dec. 102; Flack v. Harrington, 12 Am. Dec. 171; Lang v. Benedict, 29 Am. Dec. 93; 7 Encyc. of Law, 669, note.

"A magistrate of inferior court acting without or in excess of jurisdiction, is liable in damages to the party injured thereby, and can show no legal justification under any judicial record. Piper v. Pearson, 61 Am. Dec. 438; Clark v. May, 61 Am. Dec. 471; Bissell v. Gold, 19 Am. Dec. 481.

Evans & Rogers, for respondents.

The finding of the justice, that there was just reason to fear the commission of an offense against the person or the property of Meaghr and others, is conclusive evidence of probable cause. Crescent City Live Stock, etc., Co. v. Butchers' Union, etc., Co., 120 U.S. 141; Whitney v. Peckham, 15 Mass. 243; Phillips v. Village of Kalamazoo, 53 Mich. 33; Spring v. Besore, 12 B. Monroe 551; Griffis v. Sellars, (N. Car.) 31 Am. Dec. 422; Parker v. Huntington, 7 Gray 36; Cooley on Torts, p. 214; Newell on Malicious Prosecution, p. 299, sec. 22.

Under the same facts and circumstances the action for false imprisonment as against respondent Meaghr, the prosecuting witness, will not lie. Gillet v. Thiebold, 9 Kan. 292; Billings v. Russell, 23 Pa. St. 189; Landt v. Hilts, et al., 19 Barb. 283; Lancaster v. Lane, 19 Ill. 242; Barker v. Stetson, 7 Gray 53; Stanton v. Schell, 3 Sanford 329; Marks v. Culmer, Id. 12.

ZANE, C. J. BARTCH and MINER, JJ., concur.

OPINION

ZANE, C. J.

This action was brought to recover damages for the alleged malicious prosecution of the plaintiff Annie Johnston. The other defendant is her husband. They allege in their complaint that William H. Rowe was receiver of the Bear Lake & Bear River Irrigation & Canal Company, and that he and the other defendants on June 28, 1894, at the county of Box Elder, in the state of Utah, maliciously and without probable cause, instituted a prosecution before a justice of the peace against the plaintiff Annie Johnston; that they falsely alleged in their complaint that she had threatened to assault defendant Meaghr and others with deadly weapons; that the justice issued a so-called warrant upon such representations; that the defendants thereupon by force compelled her to go with them to Bear River City, in that county, where they unlawfully, maliciously, and without probable cause, imprisoned her; that they then forced her to go to Brigham City; that they imprisoned her and her infant child there in a noisome jail for the space of five days; that the justice of the peace discharged her from the proceedings to keep the peace on the 7th day of July following; and that the district court, to which the case had been taken, dismissed the same on the 18th day of October of the same year. And they alleged damages, special and general, and demanded judgment in a sum named. Thus, the plaintiffs allege that the defendants maliciously and without probable cause prosecuted the plaintiff; and they characterized the warrant upon which she was arrested as a "so-called warrant," and aver that the defendants imprisoned her unlawfully, maliciously, and add that they imprisoned her without any right or authority. In view of the fact that the complaint was not demurred to, and that the Code has adopted one form for all civil actions, plaintiffs' counsel argues, in effect, that the defendants might be found guilty of false imprisonment, or malicious prosecution; that the court might regard the complaint as stating both or either of those causes of action. In so doing, counsel, in effect, insists that the cause of action may be regarded as based on a trespass committed by defendants against the plaintiff, by unlawfully arresting and detaining her without any legal authority, or on the ground that defendants maliciously, falsely, and without probable cause, prosecuted her. There is but one count in the complaint. Two causes of action are not separately stated. If plaintiffs' position is sound their cause of action stands on a want of probable cause and malice, and also on a trespass. The gist of the one cause of action is the institution of the suit without probable cause, and with malice. The gist of the other cause of action is the unlawful, direct, and forcible invasion of a personal right,--of a person's right to liberty. The foundation fact of each cause of action differs essentially. One charges defendants with directly doing an unlawful act. The other charges them with maliciously and unlawfully causing the magistrate to issue the warrant which caused the constable to make the arrest. "Although any particular fact may be the gist of a party's cause, and the statement is indispensable, it is still a most important principle of the law of pleading that in alleging the fact it is unnecessary to state such circumstances as merely tend to prove the truth of it. The dry allegation of the facts, without detailing a variety of minute circumstances, the evidence of it, will suffice. * * * The object of the science of pleading is the production of a single issue upon the same subject-matter of dispute. The rule relating to duplicity or doubleness tends more than any other to the attainment of this object. It precludes the parties,--plaintiff as well as defendant,--in each of their pleadings, from stating or relying upon more than one matter constituting a sufficient ground of action in respect to the same demand, or a sufficient defense to the same claim, or an adequate answer to the precedent pleading of the opponent. The plaintiff cannot, by the common-law rule, in order to sustain a single demand, rely upon two or more distinct grounds or matters, each of which, independently of the other, amounts to a good cause of action in respect of such demand." 1 Chit. Pl. 125, 126.

While section 3126, 2 Comp. Laws Utah 1888, declares that "there is in this state but one form of civil action for the enforcement or protection of private rights, and the redress or prevention of private wrongs," and while all distinctions as to the forms of civil actions are abolished distinctions as to the causes of actions remain. At the common law "the joinder of actions often depends on the form of the action, rather than on the subject-matter or cause of action." 1 Chit. Pl. p. 199. This author further says that: "The science of special pleading may be considered under two heads: (1) The facts necessary to be stated; (2) the form of the statement." Page 214. In other words, the statement of the cause of action, and the form of the statement. The Code adopts one form for all civil actions, but the facts constituting the various causes of action for which that...