Storrs v. Robinson

• Decision Date: 05 March 1902
• Citation: 51 A. 516,74 Conn. 563
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: STORRS v. ROBINSON et ux.

51 A. 516

74 Conn. 563

STORRS

v. ROBINSON et ux.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

March 5, 1902.

Appeal from superior court, New Haven county; George W. Wheeler, Judge.

Action by Carlos H. Storrs, administrator, against William T. Robinson and wife. From a judgment in favor of plaintiff, defendants appeal. Reversed.

John Elliott, for appellants.

Charles S. Hamilton and Carlos H. Storrs, for appellee.

TORRANCE, C. J. This is an action by the administrator of Russell to remove a cloud from the title of certain land, to get possession of the land, and to recover mesne profits. The cloud upon the title sought to be removed consists of a recorded deed purporting to be from Russell, in his lifetime, to the defendants. The plaintiff claims, among other things, that said deed was never delivered to the defendants by Russell in his lifetime, and was never intended by him to be so delivered, and therefore that the land belonged to Russell when he died, and now belongs to his estate. The defendants claim that the deed was duly delivered in Russell's lifetime, and that they now own the land. The main contest between the parties in the trial below was upon this point of delivery of the deed in question to the defendants. Prior to the bringing of this suit the present plaintiff, as administrator of Russell, brought a suit against the present defendants for the recovery of the same land now sought to be recovered, and for mesne profits. That prior suit was tried to the jury, and a verdict and judgment therein were rendered against the present plaintiff and in favor of the present defendants. Immediately after the judgment aforesaid was rendered against him, the present plaintiff brought the present suit against the defendants. As one of the defenses to the present action, the defendants set up as a bar thereto the said former judgment claiming that the question of title to the land and of the delivery of the deed, in issue in the present case, had been in issue in the former case, and had been adjudicated in favor of the defendants. Under this defense the defendants had the right to show, if they could, that the issues in the present case, as to the title of the land and the delivery of the deed, were issues in the former case, and to do this by the production of the record in that case, supplemented, if necessary, by any appropriate extrinsic evidence. Supples v. Cannon, 44 Conn. 424. The trial court held (and, as we think, correctly) that the record...