Miller v. Miller
| Decision Date | 11 March 1912 |
| Citation | 134 N.W. 1058,154 Iowa 344 |
| Parties | BERTHA L. MILLER, Appellee, v. H. W. MILLER, MRS. MARY MILLER and BLANCHE MILLER, Appellants |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Appeal from the Perry Superior Court.--HON. JOHN SHORTLEY, Judge.
ACTION at law to recover damages for alienation of affections. Trial to a jury, verdict for $ 10,000, which the trial court reduced to the sum of $ 5,000 and for which amount judgment was rendered for plaintiff. Defendants appeal.--Reversed and remanded.
Reversed and remanded.
Howard & Sayers and A. D. Howard, for appellants.
E. J Kelly, H. G. Giddings, and J. W. Morris, for appellee.
Plaintiff is the wife of Frank R. Miller, and as such she brought this action against the defendants, who are, respectively, the parents and sister of her husband, to recover damages from them for the alleged alienation of her husband's affections.
It is charged in the petition that the defendants maliciously conspired and confederated together for the purpose of unlawfully inducing plaintiff's husband to leave her, and that as a result of their machinations and wrongful and unlawful conduct they induced him to leave her and to bring an action of divorce against her, and have since harbored him in their home and encouraged him in the prosecution of his divorce suit. These charges were each and all denied by the defendants, and upon the issues thus tendered the case was tried to a jury with the result hitherto stated.
Something like twenty-one errors are assigned as grounds for a reversal of the judgment; but, in view of the final conclusion, we do not find it necessary to consider them all.
I. Plaintiff was married to Frank R. Miller at Yale, Iowa, June 13, 1906. This was a surprise to Miller's parents; for they did not know of any courtship between the parties, and had no information regarding the proposed marriage until notified by telephone of its consummation on the day it occurred. Plaintiff had been in the Miller home but once prior to the marriage. Defendants Miller and wife at that time lived upon a farm near Herndon, and defendant Blanche Miller, the daughter, who was then married, lived at Cooper. There is testimony to the effect that none of the defendants were pleased with the marriage, and that the mother had selected another mate for her son. However this may be, the young married couple began housekeeping at Yale, where they lived for a few months, when they moved to the town of Herndon, and during the fall of the same year they moved to the Miller farm, near Herndon. Plans were immediately made for the erection of a dwelling for them upon the farm, and the building so planned was commenced in October and completed in due season; defendant H. W. Miller bearing all the expense. Furniture was also selected for this new home and paid for by the father, and he also "stocked" the place for his son. The arrangement was that the young people were to have the use of the farm rent free, so long as they paid the taxes thereon. Here the parties remained until some time in the year 1908, when it became necessary for Mrs Miller to take her daughter, Blanche, west on account of her health, and after they had gone plaintiff and her husband were induced by the father to sell off the stock on the place and to turn the farm over to the father. After the sale, plaintiff and her husband went to Spokane, Wash., on a visit, and while there it appears they had considerable trouble over his drinking. Plaintiff finally returned from the west without her husband, and upon her return she went to living with the defendants. Plaintiff says she returned for the purpose of disposing of some household furniture; while defendants say that she left her husband because he (the husband) became suspicious of her conduct with other men, and had concluded not to live with her again. However this may be, it appears that plaintiff's husband sent a telegram from Billings, Mont., to his father, asking the father to meet him in Omaha, Neb. Responding to this, the father went to Omaha and there met his son, who, it seems, had made partial arrangements to work for an automobile concern at the latter place. He refused to come back to Iowa; but, upon the father's promise to buy him an automobile, the son was induced to come back and take up his abode with his wife at the father's home. After living together a short time at the father's home, they moved into a small house constructed for a tenant upon the home farm, and in a few months thereafter moved to the city of Perry, where they occupied a house, purchased by the father, but a few blocks from one which he (the father) had purchased for himself and family. While living in Perry, plaintiff's husband became suspicious of her conduct with other men, and finally, believing that he had found her in a compromising position with one Schiller, he left her, immediately brought an action for divorce, and took up his abode with his parents.
Save as indicated, these facts are practically undisputed; but plaintiff claims that almost from the day of her marriage the defendants individually and collectively, not only objected to the marriage, but criticized and complained about everything she did, charged her with various offenses and immoralities, refused to have anything to do with her, and finally induced her husband to leave her. Plaintiff also testified to a conversation which she claims to have heard between the three defendants, while all the parties were on a visit to the old Miller home in Illinois some time in the summer of 1909, substantially as follows: Without referring at this time more specifically to the different incidents relied upon by plaintiff as establishing her cause of action, we proceed immediately to a consideration of some of the errors relied upon for a reversal.
II. Complaint is made of certain testimony given by plaintiff over defendants' objections, as to declarations made to her by her husband with reference to what defendants had said to him. In so far as these were explanatory of the husband's conduct, or indicated a reason for his leaving the plaintiff, the declarations were admissible, under the rule announced in Sexton v. Sexton, 129 Iowa 487, 105 N.W. 314; Hardwick v. Hardwick, 130 Iowa 230 at 233, 106 N.W. 639. But as some of them were not explanatory of either they were inadmissible, under the rule announced in Magers v. Magers, 143 Iowa 750, 123 N.W. 330. We shall not stop at this point to show wherein the court erred in admitting certain of these declarations. Again, it is the universal rule that such testimony, on account...
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