Robinson v. Stevens

• Decision Date: 27 January 1894
• Citation: 93 Ga. 535,21 S.E. 96
• Parties: ROBINSON et al. v. STEVENS.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

21 S.E. 96

93 Ga. 535

ROBINSON et al.

v.STEVENS.

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Jan. 27, 1894.

Fraudulent Conveyance — Husband and Wipe —Concealment of Loan—Improper Remarks of Attorney—Cure by Instructions.

1. There was no error in refusing to give in charge to the jury propositions of law which though correct in the abstract, were not applicable to the case nor authorized by the evidence.

2. No inquiry being made of her, it was no fraud by a wife, who had loaned money to her husband for use in his business, not to disclose to the public, or to persons who subsequently credited him on the faith of the money, the fact that she had made the loan, or that she was his creditor by reason thereof.

3. The trial court having required counsel for the defendant in error to desist from his improper remarks to the jury, when they were objected to, and having characterized the same as improper, and instructed the jury to disregard them, and not having been requested to declare a mistrial on account of their prejudicial effect, they were, not cause for setting aside the verdict, especially as the verdict was strongly supported by the evidence.

4. It was not error to exclude declarations of the defendant's husband and father, not made in her presence, tending to show that the money in question was given to the husband, and not to her. As to her, these declarations were mere hearsay.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Error from superior court, Hall county; C. J. Wellborn, Judge.

Action by A. M. Robinson & Co. against Lucy J. Stevens. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiffs bring error. Affirmed.

S. C. Dunlap, W. L. Telford, and J. B. Estes, for plaintiffs in error.

M. L. Smith and H. H. Dean, for defendant in error.

SIMMONS, J. On January 22, 1S90, a bill of sale expressing a consideration of $3,-000 was made to Mrs. Stevens by her husband, who was then insolvent, covering his stock of merchandise. Subsequently an equitable petition was brought against Mrs. Stevens and her husband and against C. A. Davis, her father, by Robinson & Co., for the purpose of setting aside the bill of sale, and to recover judgment against the defendants for the amount of a bill of goods sold by the plaintiffs to Stevens In June, 1889, the account for which fell due January 1, 1890. The plaintiffs claimed, among other things, that the goods were sold by them to Stevens on credit, based upon the sum of $5,000 turned over to him by Davis in February, 1889, with which sum he went into the mercantile business; and that the bill of sale to his wife was fraudulent and void as against his creditors. The suit was afterwards withdrawn as to Davis, and, Stevens having confessed judgment for the amount claimed, the case proceeded against Mrs. Stevens alone. Upon the second trial of the case a verdict was rendered in her favor, and the plaintiffs made a motion for a new trial, which was overruled, and they excepted. It appeared from the evidence at the trial that the consideration of the bill of sale was a debt of $3,000 to Mrs. Stevens from her husband; that $5,000, which had been given her by her father, was loaned by her to her husband to go into business with, upon the agreement that he was to repay her at such times and in such sums as she might demand; that he returned $2,000, and used the remainder in hisbusiness, and she took the bill of sale in payment of this balance, subject to a mortgage of the same date to Kiser & Co. She testified that this was done in perfect good faith, without any secret reservation therein to her husband, and without any intention to hinder, delay, or defraud creditors.

1. The requests to charge set out in the third and fourth grounds of the motion...