Tompkins v. Manning, Judge
| Decision Date | 31 October 1924 |
| Citation | 205 Ky. 327 |
| Parties | Tompkins, et al. v. Manning, Judge. |
| Court | Kentucky Court of Appeals |
J. A. EDGE for plaintiffs.
MURRAY L. BROWN, GEORGE G. BROCK, FRANK E. DAUGHERTY, Attorney General, and GARDNER K. BYERS, Assistant Attorney General, for defendant.
The defendant, A. T. W. Manning, judge of the Laurel circuit court, issued a rule against plaintiff, J. S. Tompkins, to show cause why he should not be punished for contempt of court committed in the publication and printing of certain alleged contemptuous matter in the Laurel County Sun, a paper owned and published by plaintiff. Tompkins employed as his attorneys the other plaintiffs, B. G. Reams, Reuben Johnson, W. M. Lewis and Ray C. Lewis, and they prepared a response to the rule issued against Tompkins and the latter swore to it and it was filed in the Laurel circuit court by the attorneys. The defendant construed the subject matter of the response as also contemptuous and entered a fine against Tompkins and his four attorneys of $30.00 each. Two of the plaintiffs paid the fine and the other three replevied the ones entered against them, and thereupon all plaintiffs filed their joint petition in this court asking for a writ of prohibition against the judge of the Laurel circuit court "and all other persons acting through him or by reason of the judgment and replevin bonds aforesaid, prohibiting and restraining him and them from enforcing or attempting to enforce the collection of either of the replevin bonds herein mentioned and from attempting to commit either of the plaintiffs herein to jail by reason of the said replevin bonds or the judgment herein mentioned by reason of their failing to pay the same or either of the same; . . . and for an order commanding and directing the said judge aforesaid to enter an order of record in the Laurel circuit court cancelling, setting aside and holding for naught the judgment aforesaid," etc.
If it should be conceded that the facts of this case conferred on this court jurisdiction under section 110 of the Constitution to grant the relief prayed for, we would then be confronted with the fact that the judgment, the enforcement of which is sought to be prohibited, has already been satisfied by two of the plaintiffs paying it as to each of them, and the other three merged the judgment against them in a replevin bond which they each executed and which has the effect to so merge the judgment, and it was so held by us in the cases of Kouns v. Bank of Kentucky, 2 B. Mon. 303; Hoskins v. Parsons, 1 Met. 251, and Gray v. Merrill, 11 Bush 633. However, if the replevin judgment was itself void for want of jurisdiction of the subject matter or of the person of defendant therein, or for any other cause, then a bond executed replevying it would also be invalid and unenforceable, as was held in the case of Bramlett v. McVey, 91 Ky. 151; and in such case the execution of the bond would not have the effect to merge or satisfy the judgment. The question in this case would then be, whether the judgments against the plaintiffs who replevied them were void for any reason, and if not the replevin bonds would be valid and their execution would merge the likewise valid judgment. We do not find any fact rendering either of the judgments invalid. The court had jurisdiction over the subject matter and of the person of each of the plaintiffs, and also had the right to proceed in the summary method employed, if a contempt was committed in the presence of the court, and the fine imposed was within the limitations that the court had authority to inflict. Without further discussing this phase of the case, we feel that it is sufficient to say that if we possessed undoubted jurisdiction to grant the relief sought, we are very much inclined to the opinion that the satisfaction of the judgments, by paying two of them and replevying the other...
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