Meyerl v. Meyerl

• Decision Date: 29 January 1901
• Citation: 84 N.W. 1109,125 Mich. 607
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: MEYERL v. MEYERL.

84 N.W. 1109

125 Mich. 607

MEYERL v. MEYERL.

Supreme Court of Michigan

January 29, 1901

Appeal from circuit court, Kent county, in chancery; Willis B Perkins, Judge.

Suit in equity by Catharina Meyerl against Ernest G. Meyerl to have a part of his estate allotted to complainant for her support and maintenance. From an order overruling a demurrer to the complaint, defendant appeals. Affirmed.

L. E Carroll, for appellant.

Charles E. Ward, for appellee.

LONG J.

In April, 1899, the parties, who are husband and wife, entered into a contract by which they agreed to live separate and apart during their natural lives. By the terms of the contract the defendant agreed to pay complainant $7 per week during her natural life, and to convey to her their home in the city of Grand Rapids, the estimated value of which was from $2,500 to $3,000, and also to convey to her to household goods, piano, horse, harness, and carriage etc., in consideration of which the complainant agreed to release the defendant from all future support and maintenance and all alimony whatsoever. This agreement was carried out and the weekly payments made until the last week in November 1899. The September, October, and November payments were enforced by suits at law in justice court upon the contract. Defendant having failed to make further payments, the bill in the present case was filed under a statute relating to support and maintenance. The bill was filed in the Kent circuit court in chancery. By subdivision 'b' the bill prays that 'this court [circuit court in chancery] make an order or decree herein by which a part of said defendant's estate, real and personal, or both, or a portion of his earnings, income, or revenue, as this court may determine in its discretion, shall be allotted, assigned, set apart, and decreed to your oratrix as alimony for her support and maintenance.' The defendant demurred to this bill, the grounds of demurrer being (1) that the complainant has an adequate remedy at law; (2) that the complainant by entering into the agreement waived her right to apply to a court of chancery for support from her husband when he failed to keep the agreement. No other grounds of demurrer are alleged. The bill filed in this case alleges, among other things, that the parties were married in April, 1877; that they continued to live together until April, 1899; that they have three children,--two daughters, aged 20 and 21 years, and a son, aged 18 years. The bill also alleges that the defendant has been guilty of extreme cruelty towards the complainant, and that, being of sufficient ability to provide for her a suitable maintenance, he has grossly, wantonly, and cruelly neglected so to do. The bill also alleges the making of the contract between the parties because of the cruel and immoral counduct of the defendant; that complainant has exhausted her legal remedies in trying to enforce it; that defendant, instead of using his money in payments on the contract, spends it with lewd women, not only to the loss of complainant pecuniarily, but to her humiliation and disgrace and the disgrace of her family; that defendant, for the purpose of preventing her from collecting anything more on the contract, has assigned a large amount of notes and accounts and other evidences of indebtedness, so that there remains little or nothing in his hands liable to execution; that he boasts that he has fixed his affairs so that she will get no more; and that he says he will go to jail, and remain there, rather than pay her anything more.

The statute under which the bill is filed (section 8686, Comp Laws 1897) provides: 'Whenever a husband shall, without good and sufficient cause, desert his wife, or shall have hereafter deserted his wife without good and sufficient cause, being of sufficient ability to support her, or shall have become an habitual drunkard since their marriage, or practices extreme cruelty towards her, or committed the crime of adultery, or any other offense that entitles the wife to a decree of divorce or of separation, and shall refuse and neglect to support his wife, either the wife or husband being a resident of this state, the circuit court in chancery of any county in this state in which the said husband or wife shall reside, shall, on the application of the wife by petition, allot, assign, set apart and decree to her as alimony the use of such part of her husband's real and...