Rozelle v. Lewis

• Decision Date: 07 December 1908
• Docket Number: 41-1908
• Citation: 37 Pa.Super. 563
• Parties: Rozelle v. Lewis, Appellant
• Court: Pennsylvania Superior Court

37 Pa.Super. 563

Rozelle v. Lewis, Appellant

No. 41-1908

Superior Court of Pennsylvania

December 7, 1908

Argued March 6, 1908 [Syllabus Matter] [Syllabus Matter] [Syllabus Matter] [Syllabus Matter]

Appeal by defendants, from judgment of C.P. Lackawanna Co.-1900, No. 425, on verdict for plaintiff in case of Orlando Rozelle v. Mary L. Lewis and B. S. Lewis.

Ejectment for land in the borough of Dunmore. Before Newcomb, J.

At the trial the jury returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff.

On rule for a new trial Newcomb, J., filed the following opinion:

This action was ejectment. May 17, 1902, there was a verdict for plaintiff subject to a point reserved by former Judge Wheaton of the eleventh district, specially presiding at the trial. Reasons were regularly filed and a rule for new trial allowed May 29, 1902. No motion for judgment was ever filed. But among the files is found such motion with an order of the trial judge indorsed thereon: " Let the within motion be marked filed as of this date, May 29, 1902." In the meantime, although not until nearly five years after the trial, Judge Wheaton retired from office. The charge of the court has never been filed. No explanation of this delay and inattention of counsel is offered.

Under these circumstances both the rule and motion for judgment may be treated as abandoned, and they should accordingly be discharged for want of due prosecution.

On the merits, however, it is believed that the case was for the jury and the verdict should not be disturbed.

The only thing seriously controverted by defendant is the admission of certain declarations of plaintiff's grantor, now deceased, touching the boundary in dispute, and upon which plaintiff's case depends.

The suit involves the location of a town lot on a plot of lands in the borough of Dunmore as " Meylert's Addition to Scranton and Green Ridge." Louisa Gilmore was formerly the owner of block 318 as described in the plot which was of record. This block comprised twenty lots of which the first ten front westerly on Adams avenue. With the exception of Nos. 1 and 10, being corner lots, they are plotted of a uniform width of forty feet. They would appear to have been conveyed to Catherine Schadt in her lifetime. For in 1890, some years after her death, Mrs. Gilmore conveyed them to Charles Tropp of this city, and Frederick Scheidell of Sullivan county, N.Y., executors of Mrs. Schadt, by deed reciting a former conveyance to the deceased which this was intended to confirm. This deed was duly recorded.

Mrs. Schadt's death occurred in July, 1886. By her will, probated in September following, she devised her estate, real and personal, to her executors in trust to carry out its specific provisions, except so far as they might discharge the bequests out of rents and profits. She further gave the executors power as follows: " In order that this my last will may be fully carried out I hereby authorize and empower my said executors to sell or convey all or any part of my estate and convert the same into money to be by them securely invested as they may see fit and to that end they are hereby authorized and empowered to make good and sufficient deeds and conveyances of any and all of my said property and invest and dispose of the proceeds as above directed."

The legal title being thus in the executors, in 1893 they conveyed lot No. 7, as described in and by the recorded plot, to Rozelle, the plaintiff, by article of agreement. The article was never recorded, but the vendee took immediate possession in accordance with its terms and improved it with a dwelling house where he has resided ever since. The contractor who built the house was Mr. Lewis, one of the defendants. There was evidence uncontradicted that at that time the corners of the lot upon which the house was built were marked by stakes on the ground; that Mr. Lewis in company with the plaintiff measured between the two on the avenue and found them to inclose forty feet; that in locating the foundation of the house they designed it so as to be twelve feet from lot No. 8 on the northerly side and six feet from No. 6 on the other side, and took measurements for that purpose. The house was twenty-two feet wide.

In 1896 Scheidell, surviving executor of Mrs. Schadt, sold lot No. 8 by articles to B. S. Lewis, Jr., and T. G. Lewis, defendant's sons. There was evidence, though contradicted, that in making their improvements these vendees recognized plaintiff's possession as he claimed it; that in laying a sidewalk on the avenue in front they conformed to his corner, and in laying a flag walk from front to rear on the southerly side of their lot, the line as he has at all times claimed it to be was discussed between him and them and that accordingly they laid their walk twelve feet from his house in order to conform to the line. There were no fences, but there was evidence that from 1897 until the controversy began in 1899 the strip of land to the south of the flag walk, now in controversy, was used by plaintiff for clothesline posts, one of which stood very close to the walk.

From the time the vendees of lot No. 8 finished their house in 1897 they together with their parents, the defendants here, have lived on the lot. In 1898 their contract was assigned to Mrs. Lewis, the substantial defendant, by her sons. In September the same year title was conveyed to her by the surviving executor. She saw the walk and the clothesline post but never made inquiry of plaintiff as to where he claimed the corners or boundary to be. There is no evidence that anyone other than plaintiff ever used, occupied, or claimed any part of the forty feet south of the flag walk until some time in the fall of 1899. At that time without consulting plaintiff and in his absence Mr. Lewis erected what he called a line fence three and six-tenths feet south of the flag walk, and reduced plaintiff's possession to thirty-six and four-tenths feet. That brought on this suit.

Defendants rely upon what they claim under the advice of surveyors is the correct location of the lot line according to the plot. While not conceding that his location varies from the plot plaintiff relies especially upon the acts and declarations of Tropp in designating the corners of lot No. 7 on the date of his contract as required by him before he would execute it. It was the admission of this evidence that is the matter chiefly in controversy now.

So far as objection went to the competency of the plaintiff to testify to the declarations of the deceased grantor acting as a trustee and executor with power to sell, we fail to see how the rule excluding the testimony of a surviving party, etc., applies, and that was not seriously urged at the argument. Granting that the witness was competent, then so far as concerns the competency of the evidence it is believed to be subject to the rules governing declarations as to boundaries by a former owner, or his agent, with power to sell. If so the estate of Mrs. Schadt would be bound by the declaration in question. The evidence was clear that at the request of plaintiff before the contract was accepted Mr. Tropp met him on the ground by appointment and there designated the lot described in the contract by corner stakes which he said had been placed by his surveyor. Upon the faith of that plaintiff signed the contract, and the executors stood by and saw him locate and build his house accordingly. This, if found to be the fact, so far as Tropp or his survivor in the trust is concerned, would bind the estate regardless of the true corner under the doctrine of Willis v. Swartz, 28 Pa. 413.

The principle upon which the decision rests is estoppel. It would, therefore, seem that the only other question would be whether the evidence was sufficient to affect Mrs. Lewis with notice of the facts which give rise to the estoppel. In effect as between vendor and vendee in such case the estoppel would amount to a defect of title in the vendor pro tanto to the extent of the discrepancy. When Mrs. Lewis afterwards took title to that, with notice, she took it subject to its infirmity.

Under adequate instructions of the learned trial judge the facts regarding the designation of his corners by the executor were found in plaintiff's favor. It was further left to the jury " to determine under the evidence whether plaintiff's possession was of such character that made it the duty of Mrs. Lewis or her assignors to inquire of the plaintiff the character of his title and the extent of his claim; " and if his " possession was of such character as to put the duty of inquiry as to its extent upon the defendants then defendants would be bound by such facts as may reasonably be concluded would have been made known as a result of such inquiry."

The verdict must be taken to have settled this question of fact in plaintiff's favor. The evidence to be considered by the jury for and against the plaintiff's contention was impartially discussed in a preceding part of the charge. We cannot say that it was insufficient to warrant the conclusion that defendants had actual notice of the extent of plaintiff's claim and constructive notice of its character, especially in the absence of any evidence that Mrs. Lewis had any knowledge of his contract. There was no evidence of anything said or done by him that would tend to mislead her in the premises. All that he said and did was consistent with the claim he now asserts. Neither she nor her assignors claim to have asserted any other or different line than such as was defined by the flag walk prior to 1899 when for some reason she had a survey made.

The reservation as found in the charge which we have had transcribed was as follows: " I reserve the question whether there is any evidence in the case...