McGrew v. Holmes

• Decision Date: 18 January 1910
• Citation: 145 Iowa 540,124 N.W. 195
• Parties: MCGREW v. HOLMES, MAYOR, ET AL.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

145 Iowa 540

124 N.W. 195

MCGREW

v.HOLMES, MAYOR, ET AL.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Jan. 18, 1910.

Appeal from District Court, Monona County; F. R. Gaynor, Judge.

Suit to recover damages for false imprisonment. There was a directed verdict for the defendants. The plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.C. R. Metcalf, for appellant.

Crary & Crary and J. A. Prichard, for appellees.

SHERWIN, J.

This is a suit against the mayor and the marshal of the town of Ute and their bondsmen, to recover damages for false imprisonment. The plaintiff, who at the time was only 12 years old, was charged with petty larceny, and thereupon the defendant Holmes, who was mayor of Ute, issued a warrant for his arrest, and placed it in the hands of the defendant marshal, a constable of the town, for service. The plaintiff was arrested and taken before the mayor, who fined him and committed him to jail where he remained two or three days. The petition alleges that the arrest, trial, and judgment were without jurisdiction and void, and that the fine and imprisonment were maliciously inflicted. Section 254--a24, Code Supp. 1907, provides that no court or magistrate shall commit a child, not yet having reached his seventeenth birthday, to a jail or police station. It is further provided therein that any such child, taken before any justice of the peace or police court, charged with a misdemeanor, shall, together with the case, be at once transferred by said justice of the peace or police court to said district court and proper order shall be made therefor. The plaintiff was charged with a misdemeanor; and, he being at the time under 17 years of age, the mayor, acting as a justice of the peace, had no authority to fine him or to commit him to jail. Section 691 of the Code gives mayors the jurisdiction of a justice of the peace in criminal matters, and section 5098 of the Code expressly provides that a mayor shall have power to hear complaints or preliminary informations, issue warrants, order arrests, etc. There is nothing in section 254a24, or in the entire chapter relating to juvenile courts, so far as we have been able to examine and understand it, which deprives a justice of the peace or a mayor of the original jurisdiction conferred by the sections of the Code to which we have referred. On the contrary, it seems to recognize that such magistrates have jurisdiction to cause juvenile offenders to be brought before them, and to deal with them in the manner therein provided. If it be true, then, that the mayor had jurisdiction of the subject-matter and of the defendant who was charged with a misdemeanor, his judgment imposing a fine and imprisonment was merely in excess of his jurisdiction, and such acts would not render him liable in a civil action for damages. In some jurisdictions liability of judges and magistrates for their judicial acts is denied, whether acting within their jurisdiction or not. But we need not now go to that length, because here we think the mayor had original jurisdiction of the subject-matter, and that he acted only in excess of such jurisdiction. That no liability exists in such cases is well settled by our own decisions and by the weight of authority in other jurisdictions. In this state there is no distinction between the liability of a judge of a court of general jurisdiction and the liability of a justice of the peace for their judicial acts. Thompson v. Jackson et al., 93 Iowa, 376, 61 N. W. 1004, 27 L. R. A. 92;Londegan v. Hammer, 30 Iowa, 508;Jones v. Brown, 54 Iowa, 74, 6 N. W. 140, 37 Am. Rep. 185;Henke v. McCord, 55 Iowa, 378, 7 N. W. 623;Wasson v. Mitchell, 18 Iowa, 153. And the cases cited and many others hold that a judicial officer is not liable in a civil action for his errors or mistakes.

The case at bar is directly within the rule stated in Londegan v. Hammer, supra. In that case the plaintiff was tried before a justice of the peace on a charge of willful trespass, and the court rendered a judgment not authorized by law. It was said that the justice had jurisdiction of the subject-matter and of the person, but exceeded his jurisdiction by rendering a judgment that he had no power to render. The justice was held not liable. Green v. Talbot was an action to recover damages for false imprisonment. The defendant was mayor of a town, and fined the...