McHenry v. Sneer

• Decision Date: 20 October 1881
• Citation: 10 N.W. 234,56 Iowa 649
• Parties: MCHENRY v. SNEER AND OTHERS.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

56 Iowa 649

10 N.W. 234

MCHENRY

v.SNEER AND OTHERS.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Filed October 20, 1881.

Appeal from Polk circuit court.

One of the defendants was at one time mayor and the others members of the council of the city of Des Moines. The plaintiff was police judge of said city, and brings this action to recover damages caused by certain wrongful acts done by the defendants. A demurrer to the substituted and amended petition was sustained, and the plaintiff appeals.M. D. McHenry, pro se.

W. E. Miller and Wm. Phillips, for appellant.

Parsons & Runnells, for appellees.

SEEVERS, J.

It is said in the argument of appellant that the “substituted and amended petitions are both more circumstantial than they should have been,” and what is termed a more “concise statement containing the essence” of said petitions is set out in the argument, and we adopt it as being correct. It is as follows:

“(1) Plaintiff was elected to the office and entered upon the duties of police judge of the city of Des Moines for a full term of two years, commencing on the fourth day of March, 1878.

(2) At that time, by the laws of the state and ordinances of the city, the police judge was entitled to collect and receive from parties defendant of the county or the city, as the case might be, the same fees as justices of the peace were entitled to collect in like cases, and in addition one dollar for clerk's services in each case.

(3) That the fees aforesaid, according to the course of business usually current in the court, amounted to $4,000 a year; and from the commencement of plaintiff's labors in the court in March, 1878, until October of the same year, were worth at that rate.

(4) The defendant Sneer was mayor, and the other defendants members of the city council, and they, well knowing the premises, and that by law the plaintiff's emoluments could not be diminished during his term, the city council, the defendants concurring, about the twenty-eighth of March, 1878, passed an ordinance fixing the salary of defendant as police judge at $1,000 a year in lieu of fees, and requiring him to collect in all cases the same fees as theretofore, but to pay all fees into the city treasury, which ordinance was void; that the plaintiff refused to accept this salary and claimed the fees.

(5) That thereupon the defendants, conspiring together to punish the plaintiff for official acts, in the course of his business, which were distasteful to them, or some of them, and in order to compel and force him to accept said salary in full of all compensation, and to pay over his fees into the city treasury, did maliciously and unlawfully agree together that said Sneer, as mayor of the city, should direct the police force of the city to report no arrests, made for violations of state laws or city ordinances, to the police court, with the malicious purpose and intent of depriving plaintiff of the usual fees of his office, and with no regard to the proper enforcement of the law; and that the other defendants, at the request of Sneer, and in malicious concert with him, prepared certain resolutions, which all the defendants procured to be adopted by the council, unlawfully directing the city solicitor to bring prosecutions under state laws instead of city ordinances; requesting the mayor to order the police force to make returns of arrests in all cases to justices of the peace instead of the police court; *...