Shelton v. Daniel, 5-2933

• Decision Date: 15 April 1963
• Docket Number: No. 5-2933,5-2933
• Citation: 236 Ark. 454,366 S.W.2d 709
• Parties: Liller Mae SHELTON, Appellant, v. Rachel DANIEL et al., Appellees.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

Page 709

366 S.W.2d 709

236 Ark. 454

Liller Mae SHELTON, Appellant, v. Rachel DANIEL et al., Appellees.

No. 5-2933.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

April 15, 1963.

Hall, Purcell & Boswell, Benton, for appellant.

Fred E. Briner, Benton, for appellees.

HOLT, Justice.

This is an action to quiet and confirm title to one hundred and twenty (120) acres of land. The appellees are Rachel Daniel, widow of J. W. Daniel, and their adult children, Doyle Daniel, Dorman Daniel, Guinn Daniel and Clint Daniel. The appellant is Liller Mae Shelton, widow of Robert Shelton. The appellees assert in their complaint that their ownership of this farm is based upon (1) a lost and unrecorded deed made in 1920 by Robert Shelton conveying the property to J. W. Daniel and R. W. Daniel, a partnership; (2) an order of the Saline Chancery Court on September 16, 1927; and (3) that appellant's title claim is barred by laches and estoppel. Appellant filed her answer and denied the validity of each of appellees' claims. Appellant contends she is the rightful owner because (1) she is the surviving widow of the record holder of the legal title, Robert Shelton, who died intestate in 1920 and (2) she has a quitclaim deed dated in 1959 from her children and heirs of her deceased husband. The court vested title in appellees and therefrom comes this appeal.

Thus, the evidence on these rival claims necessarily covers a span of approximately forty (40) years. For several years before Robert Shelton died intestate in 1920 he had an open account with J. W. Daniel and R. W. Daniel who owned, as a partnership, a general mercantile store. It is undisputed that Shelton owed the store an annual balance which in 1918 amounted to $229.76. Mrs. Rachel Daniel testified that Mr. Shelton gave her husband, J. W. Daniel, an instrument in 1918 or 1919 which she understood was a deed based on their various business transactions. She claimed that the instrument or deed was entrusted to her lawyer, now deceased. No such instrument or deed is recorded or found. The partnership ledger on Shelton's account reflects the following entry dated January 20, 1919: 'By payment by place even.' J. W. Daniel died intestate in 1926 and on September 16, 1927, the chancery court decreed a partition of the partnership property and therefrom awarded the lands in question to appellees. The appellant was not made a party to this proceeding. It is undisputed that since about 1918 J. W. Daniel, or his widow and heirs, the appellees, have paid the taxes on this property except in 1959 when appellant's daughter paid them as delinquent taxes. The appellees have never lived on the property. However, in addition to the payment of taxes for approximately forty (40) years, they have exercised other acts of ownership and control such as leasing the property to numerous tenants for farming purposes, building and maintaining fences thereon, the rebuilding of a dwelling which had burned; using the lands for pasture and raising cattle; the planting of some 2,000 pine seedling trees on two different occasions; the cutting of timber and otherwise general management of the property. The testimony of other witnesses tends to corroborate appellees.

Appellant admits that her husband, Robert Shelton, had business transactions with J. W. Daniel and, according to her and her daughter's testimony, Shelton gave Daniel a mortgage on the farm about 1919, which mortgage was transferred from his mules to the farm so he sell the mules. There is no record evidence of such mortgage. Mrs. Shelton denied ever signing any instrument in favor of the Daniels. She testified she was never financially able to pay the mortgage she thought existed. There is no evidence that appellant or anyone else ever made any effort to determine from the appellees or elsewhere the existence, amount, or terms of such a mortgage. Her daughter testified that she had consulted several lawyers before 1949 about their legal rights and for the past 15 years she and other members of the family, living in close proximity, had frequently observed the farm with the belief appellees 'were entitled to use it until the mortgage was paid.' According to the evidence appellees' right of ownership of the land was challenged in 1959. This consisted of two acts: Appellant's daughter paid the delinquent taxes and appellant filed a quitclaim deed to the property, which deed was executed to her by the heirs of Robert Shelton, her deceased husband.

The decree recites that the court:

'* * * finds the lands in question * * * were owned by Robert Shelton and that J. W. Daniel purchased said lands from Robert Shelton on or about the year 1918. That a deed was never delivered to J. W. Daniel but that the heirs of Robert Shelton are now barred by laches and estopped from claiming any interest in said lands * * *.'

Appellant urges for reversal that the doctrine of laches does not apply against those seeking to enforce legal title. We think that the recent case of Mize v. Mize, 236 Ark. 70, 364 S.W.2d 671, is ample authority to reject this contention of appellant. The facts in the Mize case are similar to the case at bar. Both of these cases were tried before the same Chancellor and similar decrees were rendered in each case. In the Mize case we said:

'From the facts herein enumerated, it is established that for a period of more than forty years, though he lived within a comparatively short distance of the land, did some visiting with members of the Sheridan family, and was aware of the improvements that had been made to the premises, no action was ever taken * * * to enforce his claim to the property.'

Further, quoting from Tatum v. Arkansas Lumber Co., 103 Ark. 251, 146 S.W. 135:

"Laches in legal significance is not mere delay, but delay that works disadvantage to another. * * * The disadvantage may come from the loss of evidence, change of title, intervention of...