Maxwell v. Vaught

• Decision Date: 06 June 1884
• Docket Number: 11,235
• Citation: Maxwell v. Vaught, 96 Ind. 136 (Ind. 1884)
• Parties: Maxwell v. Vaught
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

96 Ind. 136

Maxwell v. Vaught

No. 11,235

Supreme Court of Indiana

June 6, 1884

From the Shelby Circuit Court.

E. P Ferris, W. W. Spencer and J. S. Ferris, for appellant.

J. B McFadden, for appellee.

OPINION

Bicknell C. C.

The appellant brought this suit against the appellee. The complaint was in two paragraphs. The first demanded the possession of land, damages for its wrongful detention, and that the title thereto be quieted. The second paragraph demanded partition.

The answer was the general denial.

The issues were tried by the court, who made a special finding of the facts and stated conclusions of law thereon in favor of the defendant, the plaintiff excepted to the conclusions of law. Judgment was rendered for the defendant; the plaintiff appealed. Error is assigned upon the conclusions of law.

The special findings were substantially that James Yohe owned the land in dispute, and exchanged it with Jacob Halfacre for other land; that Halfacre made him a deed and put him in possession of the other land; that Halfacre took possession of the land in dispute, but Yohe, having no other interest in it, retained the title thereto, and agreed that whenever Halfacre should find a purchaser, he would convey it to such purchaser for the benefit of Halfacre; that Halfacre, having made valuable improvements on the land in dispute, died in possession of it in September, 1878; that said exchange of lands was made in December, 1876; that by his last will Jacob Halfacre devised to his son Philip Halfacre the undivided one-fifth of said land, and devised the remainder to other devisees, and that from December 6th, 1876, to the death of Jacob Halfacre in September, 1878, said Yohe held said land in trust for Jacob Halfacre, and afterwards held it in trust for the benefit of said Philip Halfacre and said other devisees, and that Yohe had no other interest in said land than as such trustee; that said Philip Halfacre had remained insolvent since his father's death, and had no property except his interest as such devisee; that in March, 1872, the plaintiff and William H. Fry and William B. Thurston recovered a judgment against said Philip in the court of common pleas of Shelby county for $ 324.50, of which judgment the plaintiff, before March 15th, 1880, became sole owner; that on June, 28th, 1880, the Shelby Circuit Court, after due notice to Philip Halfacre, and on proof that said judgment was wholly unpaid, gave leave to issue execution thereon, and that in said proceeding said court rendered judgment that said undivided one-fifth of said land was held in trust by said Yohe for said Philip Halfacre from the time of his father's death in September, 1878, and was subject to the lien of plaintiff's said judgment; that the plaintiff afterwards issued execution on said judgment, which was levied on said undivided one-fifth, and the said one-fifth was duly sold by the sheriff to the plaintiff for $ 300, and the sheriff made a deed to the plaintiff therefor on the 13th of January, 1883; that the rents and profits of the eighty acres, of which said one-fifth is part, are of the value of $ 150 for each of the last two years; that on July 2d, 1876, Alfred C. Thompson obtained a judgment against said Philip Halfacre, before a justice of the peace, for $ 41.33, and on the 22d of January, 1878, Peter Wallace recovered a like judgment for $ 75.45, and assigned it to said Alfred C. Thompson, who filed a transcript of each of said judgments in the clerk's office of said Shelby county, which were there duly recorded and docketed, together with certificates of the proper officers, showing that executions on said judgments had been duly issued and duly returned nulla bona; that Harvey C. McClelland, on December 6th, 1878, obtained a judgment in the Johnson Circuit Court against said Philip Halfacre for $ 408.08, a duly certified transcript of which was duly filed and recorded in said Shelby county; that in December, 1878, said Alfred C. Thompson filed in the Shelby Circuit Court his complaint against said Philip Halfacre and others to subject the equitable interest aforesaid of said Philip Halfacre to execution and sale to satisfy his judgments aforesaid, the said Thompson averring that he had an equitable lien on said undivided one-fifth part; that on the 19th of December, 1878, said Harvey C. McClelland filed a like complaint upon his judgment aforesaid; that upon said complaints the said court rendered separate judgments in favor of said Thompson and in favor of said McClelland, and that they each had the lien they claimed on the equitable interest of said Philip Halfacre in said one-fifth of said eighty acres, and that said equitable interest should be sold to satisfy said liens; that under said judgments the sheriff duly sold said equitable interest to Alfred C. Thompson, who afterwards assigned his certificate of sale to Gabriel M. Overstreet, who obtained the sheriff's deed for said equitable interest on the 7th of September, 1880, which afterwards, by deed, was conveyed to the defendant in the present suit, William M. Vaught; that in the plaintiff Maxwell's suit aforesaid to establish said trust, neither Alfred C. Thompson nor Harvey McClelland were parties, and that in said suits of Alfred C. Thompson and Harvey McClelland to subject said equitable interest, said John M. Maxwell was not a party.

The conclusions of law upon the foregoing facts were:

1. That said equitable interest of said Philip Halfacre was never subject to execution to satisfy the judgment held by the appellant John M. Maxwell, and that said judgment was not a lien on said equitable interest.

2. That the said judgments of Thompson and McClelland did become liens upon said equitable interest, and that such interest was properly sold to satisfy said judgments.

3. That upon such last mentioned sale said Philip Halfacre was divested of all his said equitable interest except the right to redeem the same from said sale.

Upon an exception to conclusions of law upon facts specially found the facts are taken to be correctly found for the purpose of determining the validity of the exception. Gregory v. Van Voorst, 85 Ind. 108. Where the facts are not correctly found, the remedy is a motion for a new trial, for the reason that the finding is not sustained by sufficient evidence. Cruzan v. Smith, 41 Ind. 288. In this case the court, after finding that one undivided fifth of Jacob Halfacre's eighty acres was devised by him to Philip Halfacre, and that the remaining four-fifths were devised by said Jacob to his other descendants, continues thus: "And that said real estate was held by the said James Yohe in trust for Jacob Halfacre from the 6th day of December, 1876, to his death in September, 1878, and from that date the same was held by said Yohe, in trust for the benefit of Philip Halfacre and the other legatees under the will of Jacob...