People's Savings Bank & Trust Co. v. Keith

• Decision Date: 28 February 1903
• Citation: 34 So. 925,136 Ala. 469
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court
• Parties: PEOPLE'S SAVINGS BANK & TRUST CO. v. KEITH.

34 So. 925

136 Ala. 469

PEOPLE'S SAVINGS BANK & TRUST CO. v. KEITH.

Supreme Court of Alabama

February 28, 1903

Appeal from Circuit Court, Jefferson County; A. A. Coleman, Judge.

Action by Mary D. Keith against the People's Savings Bank &amp Trust Company. From a judgment overruling defendant's motion for a new trial, it appeals. Reversed.

Walker Tillman, Campbell & Walker, for appellant.

Banks &amp Selheimer, for appellee.

DOWDELL J.

This was an action brought by the appellee against the appellant bank for $217.52, which appellee claimed to have on deposit in said bank, and which it (the bank) refused to pay to her on demand. The pleas were the general issue and payment. On the trial the jury rendered a verdict in in favor of the plaintiff. The defendant moved the court to set aside the verdict, and that it be granted a new trial, on several grounds, among which was that the verdict was contrary to the weight of the evidence. This motion was denied, and this constitutes the only question presented by the record for our consideration. There are other assignments of error, but they relate to rulings of the court on the admission and rejection of evidence on the trial, and these cannot be considered since no bill of exceptions was taken and signed at the term of the court at which the trial was had. The bill of exceptions contained in the transcript was signed at a subsequent term of the court to that at which the trial was had, and in the term at which the motion for a new trial was heard and acted on. It may therefore be looked to for the purpose of reviewing the action of the court on the motion for a new trial, and only for that purpose. In Cobb v. Malone & Collins, 92 Ala. 630, 9 So. 738, this court laid down the following rule, which has ever since been followed, in reviewing the action of the trial court in refusing to grant a new trial on the ground of the insufficiency of the evidence, or that the verdict is contrary to the evidence: "The decision of the lower court will not be reversed, unless, after allowing all reasonable presumptions of its correctness, the preponderance of the evidence against the verdict is so decided as to clearly convince the court that it is wrong and unjust." The contention in the case was over the genuineness of the check of March 5, 1898, for $217.52, the amount of balance claimed by the plaintiff. The appellee (plaintiff), testifying in her own behalf, denied signing the check and getting the money. In this respect no other witness was introduced by her. John D. Elliott, cashier of the defendant bank, and W. T. Latham, one of its employés, were introduced as witnesses for the defendant, and both testified in a most positive manner to having seen the plaintiff sign the check and get the money. She was...