Railroad Company v. Schutte

• Decision Date: 01 October 1879
• Citation: 25 L.Ed. 605,100 U.S. 644
• Parties: RAILROAD COMPANY v. SCHUTTE
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

100 U.S. 644

100 U.S. 644

25 L.Ed. 605

RAILROAD COMPANY v. SCHUTTE.

October Term, 1879

MOTION to vacate the supersedeas, and dismiss an appeal from the Circuit Court of the United States for the Northern District of Florida.

The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.

Mr. Matt. H. Carpenter and Mr. Wayne Mac Veagh in support of the motion.

Mr. Philip Phillips and Mr. William A. Maury, contra.

MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WAITE delivered the opinion of the court.

In this case the appellees have moved,——

1. To vacate the supersedeas, because the approval of the supersedeas bond by the justice of this court, who allowed the appeal, was obtained by fraud and perjury; and,

2. To dismiss the appeal, because the transcript of the record which has been filed in this court is not complete, and is not properly certified.

The appellants also have moved for leave to file a new bond in case the old one shall be set aside.

1. As to the vacation of the supersedeas.

That the approval of the bond was brought about by gross fraud and perjury is so conclusively shown that no attempt has been made to deny it. The evidence also shows with equal certainty that the bond was obtained in the most irregular way. A lawyer who, to say the least, was an entire stranger to all the parties in interest, was employed to procure, within thirty-six or forty-eight hours, sureties for the appellants sufficient to secure the payment of $100,000. He was to be paid for his services six bonds of $1,000 each of the Florida Central Railroad Company the appellant corporation, which were then of no marketable value. In due time he produced the requisite number of persons to sign as sureties. When they came, the 'usual form of justification of about four lines in length' was 'ignored,' and a full affidavit was drawn for each surety, wherein was set forth 'the name and residence of the surety, the amount of real estate, its location, its value, whether or not incumbered, if so, to what amount; next, the amount of his personal property, its character, whether or not incumbered, and if so, to what amount; next, whether or not the surety was upon any other bond; next, whether or not there were any judgments against the surety; and finally summing up that he owned so much over all his debts and liabilities, naming the sum. Each of these questions each surety answered favorably, and swore to. The justifications were extraordinary in their minuteness, as the affidavits will show.'

This being done, a bond sufficient in form was signed by the 'procured' sureties. One of the persons who signed, said to be a 'very wealthy man,' was paid $125 for what he did. Another, 'the son of a former judge of the Supreme Court of the State of New York,' received $12.50; another, a clored porter in a lawyer's office, $10; another was paid $10; and another was promised $50, but actually paid nothing. They were all irresponsible pecuniarily, and known to or suspected by the police of the city of New York as 'purchasable sureties.' The money to pay them for their fraudulent work was furnished by an agent of the appellant company under the form of buying back one of the worthless bonds promised as a reward for what was done.

After the bond was executed by the sureties thus obtained, the president of the appellant corporation was called in. He signed officially the name of the corporation, and affixed the corporate seal, but did not see, or ask to see, any of the persons who had become bound with his company. Neither he nor any other person actually interested in the litigation became in any manner personally bound.

With such a bond, procured in such a way, the president of the corporation presented himself at the last moment to the justice of this court, who heard the cause in the Circuit Court at his summer residence in Vermont, and asked that the bond be approved. On its presentation, as we are informed by the testimony of the president himself, the justice read and seemed to be impressed 'with the fulness and particularity of the justifications.' He said, 'This seems to be a good bond.' The reply was, 'Yes, Judge, I believe it to be a very good bond.' The justice then asked as to one of the parties whose name appeared, and the reply was, 'I am informed that he is the son of a former judge of the Supreme Court of the State of New York of that name,' adding that another of the...