Pease v. Pease

• Decision Date: 06 August 1923
• Docket Number: 2580.
• Citation: 217 P. 239,47 Nev. 124
• Parties: PEASE v. PEASE.
• Court: Nevada Supreme Court

217 P. 239

47 Nev. 124

PEASE v. PEASE.

No. 2580.

Supreme Court of Nevada

August 6, 1923

Appeal from District Court, Washoe County; Thomas F. Moran, Judge.

Action by Suel E. Pease against Mae Pease. From a decree dismissing the action without prejudice, defendant appeals. Affirmed.

Ayres & Gardiner, of Reno, for appellant.

Platt & Sanford, of Carson City, and John S. Sanai, of Reno, for respondent.

DUCKER C.J.

This is an appeal taken by the defendant from a decree dismissing an action for divorce. It is set out in the decree that the dismissal is without prejudice to the plaintiff to start a new suit with the same cause of action set forth in his amended complaint in the event a reconciliation cannot be had between the parties. The action was brought on the ground of extreme cruelty alleged to have been committed by the defendant after a decree for separate maintenance had been made and entered in favor of the defendant and against the plaintiff by the court of Sangamon county, state of Illinois on the 3d day of May, 1919. In this connection it is alleged that prior to said date, and ever since, the parties have been living separate and apart from the other. The acts of cruelty alleged are denied in the answer, and nonsupport and willful desertion for more than one year prior to the filing of the complaint, and the pleadings in the suit and decree for separate maintenance in the circuit court of the state of Illinois, in and for the county of Sangamon, are set up as affirmative defenses.

The prayer of the answer asks that plaintiff take nothing by his said case and that defendant be dismissed with her costs, and for all other proper orders, and for general relief.

The trial court found that the jurisdictional facts alleged in the complaint were true, but that the acts of cruelty charged therein were not true. It also found the allegations of willful desertion in a supplemental complaint to be untrue.

As to the issues raised by the answer, the trial court found that the affirmative defense of nonsupport was untrue, except that since September 22, 1922, plaintiff has paid to the defendant on account of the said Sangamon county decree the sum of only $160. No finding was made as to the affirmative defense of willful desertion. The trial court found that all of the allegations of the affirmative defense setting up the record of the circuit court of Sangamon county, state of Illinois are true, and that the copies of such record attached to defendant's answer are full, true, and correct copies; but it is of the opinion, as evidenced by the findings and conclusions of law, that such record is not sufficient to establish a recriminatory defense, or the defense of res adjudicata.

The defendant contends that it is sufficient, and that on the findings she is...