Lewis v. Baker

• Decision Date: 27 February 1911
• Docket Number: 18,502
• Citation: Lewis v. Baker, 128 La. 92, 54 So. 482 (La. 1911)
• Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
• Parties: LEWIS et al. v. BAKER. In Re Lewis

54 So. 482

128 La. 92

LEWIS et al. v. BAKER.

In Re Lewis

No. 18,502

Supreme Court of Louisiana

February 27, 1911

Action by William Lewis and others against Gabriel Baker.Judgment for plaintiffs was reversed by the Court of Appeals, and plaintiffs applied for certiorari or writ of review.Proceeding dismissed.

Emmet Alpha, for plaintiffs.

Foster Milling, Brian & Saal, for respondent.

OPINION

MONROE J.

Statement of the Case.

This case is before the court for the purposes of the review of a judgment of the Court of Appeal, parish of St. Mary (reversing a judgment rendered by the district court of that parish), and may be stated as follows:

Plaintiffs William, Saphronia, and Lizzie Lewis, inherited, in indivision from their mother, Martha Lewis, a certain lot upon the edge of the town of Franklin, upon which there was a house where the decedent had lived, and which is said to have been placed there by the defendant, who is an older and illegitimate son, to whom plaintiffs sold the interests so inherited by them; William, on July 3, 1907, for $ 100; Saphronia, on June 4, 1908, for $ 100; and Lizzie (now wife of Joseph Young), on August 18, 1908, for $ 150.Thereafter, on September 24, 1908, they instituted this suit alleging that when said sales were made the property was worth $ 2,000, and each of their said interests one-third of that amount, a fact of which defendant was well informed, and that he induced them to make the sales by threatening them with litigation and expense.Wherefore they prayed for judgment, as usual in actions of rescission, for lesion beyond moiety.Defendant answered that he had paid a fair price for the property, and, further, that his mother was left with the three children, in the early eighties, and was dependent upon her daily labor for her and their support, having no other property, save the lot in question, which was then unimproved; that he built the house and otherwise improved the lot, under an agreement with his mother that he should have the right to remove the improvements, if necessary; and that he there supported his mother and the plaintiffs for a number of years and up to the date of her death, about four years before the institution of this suit, for which he would have asserted a claim against her succession, but that plaintiffs recognized him as the owner of the said improvements and voluntarily proposed that he should buy their interests in the lot, which he did, without practicing any fraud or overreaching.He prayed that plaintiffs' demand be rejected, or, in the event that judgment be rendered in their favor, that he be decreed to be the owner of the improvements, and that they be condemned to return the $ 350 paid them, together with $ 50 expended in notary's fees, and that they further be condemned to pay him, as a creditor of his mother's succession, for money expended for her support, the sum of $ 1,000, as also the sum of $ 75, expended in taxes.

There was judgment in the district court in July, 1909, in favor of plaintiffs on the question of lesion, fixing the value of the land at $ 1,168.50; ordering defendant to elect, etc., whether he would pay the difference or have the sales rescinded; recognizing him to be the owner of the house; allowing him $ 5.05 for taxes paid, and apparently (in the decree) ignoring his claim for $ 1,000.Both sides appealed, and in October, 1909, the Court of Appeal rendered judgment decreeing:

"That the judgment appealed from, rescinding the sales made by plaintiffs to defendant, be annulled, avoided, and reversed; that the part of the decree recognizing the ownership of the house in defendant be affirmed, and that plaintiffs pay the cost of the reconventional demand; that the claim of defendant for $ 1,000 against plaintiffs be rejected, and * * * that this case be remanded for the reception of evidence on the question of lesion or the value of the things sold at the time of the respective sales, in accordance with the views above expressed, and that the claim of the defendant for the notarial, recorder's, and tax charges be left open and relegated to the decision of the question of lesion," etc.

The particular "views" referred to in the decree are stated, in part, as follows:

"Here the suit was instituted and the trial was conducted on the theory that the immovable should be estimated as a whole, either at the time of the sale or after the entire property had been acquired by defendant.* * * The one undivided third interest in the land was the immovable sold by each vendor, and the estimates should have been directed to the value of such undivided interests at the time of the respective sales."

The judgment so rendered became final.The case was again heard in the district court upon the issues which were left undecided, and there was judgment for plaintiffs on the question of lesion vel non as before, save that the judge of the district court deducted from the valuation of each of the third interests in question the sum of $ 20, as its estimated proportion of the cost of a partition suit, and from the aggregate valuation the sum of $ 25, as the estimated attorney's fees for the bringing of such suit, thus reducing the valuation of each third from $ 389.50, as in the former judgment, to $ 344.50.Defendant again appealed, and plaintiffs answered, praying that the $ 5.05 allowed for taxes, the $ 60 allowed for costs of a partition suit, and the $ 25 allowed as attorney's fees be disallowed.And the judgment appealed from was again reversed, and plaintiffs' demand finally rejected; the reasons assigned by the Court of Appeal for such ruling being, in substance, as follows, to wit:

"The case was remanded for proof to establish the value of the undivided interest of each vendor in the naked land at the time of the respective sales, taking into account certain risks and uncertainties which entered into the problem of value.The reasons and authorities upon which the court based its conclusions are given in the original opinion, * * * and we deem it unnecessary to say here what we have said before.On the second trial plaintiffs did not offer any evidence to prove the value, at the time of the respective sales, of the undivided interests of each vendor in the tract sold.They contented themselves with proof to establish the value of the tract as a whole, in contravention of the findings of this court.The defendant, on the other hand, introduced proof to show the value, at the date of the sales, of the undivided interest of each vendor in the land.This value is fixed by the evidence at the sum of $ 100, * * * or an amount slightly above that sum," etc.

Opinion.

The judge of the district court and the counsel for plaintiffs appear to have construed the ruling of the Court of Appeal on the first hearing of the case as having meant that the value of the property, as a whole, was not to be taken into account, in determining the value of the undivided one-third interests which had been sold by plaintiffs.We understand the Court of Appeal to have meant that the thing to be ascertained was the value of each of the undivided interests at the date at which it was sold, and that the testimony adduced as to the value of the whole property could not be accepted as conclusive on that point; but we do not understand the court to have meant that such testimony was inadmissible or irrelevant, or that it would not be considered, in connection with testimony of a mere specific character, as tending to aid the main inquiry.The court however, found on the first appeal that plaintiffs had offered but little, if any, direct testimony as to the value of the undivided interests in question at the dates at which they were sold, or at any other time, as contradistinguished from the value of the whole property, and that the testimony offered by them as to the value of the whole property related, for the most part, to the time of the trial, which was a year or more after the last of the sales by plaintiffs had been made; and upon the second appeal it found that upon the second hearing in the district courtplaintiffs had proceeded upon the theory that a correct valuation of the respective interests that had been sold could be arrived at merely by taking the valuation of the whole property, as testified to by their witnesses, and deducting therefrom the estimated amount which it might be necessary to expend, by way of costs and attorney's fees, in effecting a partition, and that accordingly they(plaintiffs) had introduced no additional evidence, save such as related to those costs and fees.It is conceded by the judge of the district court, and by plaintiffs' counsel, that the main inquiry was as to the value of plaintiffs'...