Pitchford v. Stoddard, (No. 16745.)

• Decision Date: 20 April 1926
• Docket Number: (No. 16745.)
• Citation: 133 S.E. 59,35 Ga.App. 276
• Parties: PITCHFORD . v. STODDARD et al.
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals

35 Ga.App. 276

133 S.E. 59

PITCHFORD .

v.STODDARD et al.

(No. 16745.)

Court of Appeals of Georgia,

Division No. 2.

April 20, 1926.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Error from Superior Court, Fulton County; E. D. Thomas, Judge.

Suit by H. W. Pitchford against W. J. Stoddard and others. Judgment for defendants, and plaintiff brings error. Affirmed.

The plaintiff, by her petition as amended, sought to recover of the defendants $100,000 as damages, and alleged the following: Plaintiff was the owner of an apartment house in the city of Atlanta, consisting of 18 units, all of which were rented except 2, One of these was occupied by the plaintiff, and the other had been promised to a prospective tenant, who had made a deposit thereon and had planned to move in. The defendants-two men and a woman (the wife of a third man)—were on February 9, 1924, detected and arrested while they "were closeted in petitioner's apartment building around a bottle of intoxicating liquor belonging to" one of them. Unit No. 7, where the defendants were arrested, had been occupied by one of the men and the woman clandestinely and for immoral purposes from the fall of 1923 until the date of their arrest, February 9, 1924. All three of the defendants were in the building at the particular time and place for the purpose of drinking whisky and that they did drink whisky in violation of law. Because they were detected while so "closeted in a room of said apartment building surrounding and drinking the contents of a bottle of intoxicating liquor, " cases were docketed against them in the police court of the city of Atlanta "under the specific charge of occupying a 'dive'." On account of the nature and circumstances of the arrest and the prominence of the parties, the story of the arrest was published in practically all the newspapers of the South, and was read and talked about by the citizens of Atlanta and elsewhere. In the newspaper articles it was stated that the defendants were accused of occupying a "dive." The plaintiff had no knowledge of the fact that the defendants "were present in her apartment building with a bottle of whisky, and * * * said whisky was brought into said apartment building without petitioner's knowledge or consent."

The plaintiff's house was not a "dive, " but "was a respectable and refined apartment building in the most fashionable location of the city, and had always been tenanted by cultured people of the most refined and best families of Atlanta's exclusive social circles, and a most valuable piece of property." The building was worth $110,000, and the loans, taxes, and insurance thereon were being paid by revenues received from tenants, and the rentals were sufficient to take care of all the expenses necessary for the conduct and operation of the building and to reduce the loans materially, and "in the course of time all loans would have been paid and petitioner would have owned the property in fee simple, free and unincumbered." The plaintiff's tenants, however, "on account of the publicity and notoriety of the building, in which it was dubbed both in newspaper articles and in conversation as a 'dive, ' moved out and left the building with only 3 or 4 units occupied." Thereafter the revenues from the building were reduced below the amount necessary to pay the loans, interest, taxes, insurance, upkeep, and operating expenses, and the plaintiff's creditors took possession of the property and sold it under an order of court at a forced sale, on November 10, 1924, and petitioner was ...