Waggoner v. Mann

• Decision Date: 27 May 1891
• Citation: 83 Iowa 17,48 N.W. 1065
• Parties: WAGGONER ET AL. v. MANN ET AL.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

83 Iowa 17

48 N.W. 1065

WAGGONER ET AL.

v.MANN ET AL.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

May 27, 1891.

Appeal from district court, Jackson county; A. HOWAT, Judge.

Action in chancery to quiet the title of certain lands in plaintiff. There was a decree granting the relief prayed for in the petition. Defendants appeal.Peck & House and D. A. Wynkoop, for appellants.

Ellis & McCoy, William Graham, and W. C. Gregory, for appellees.

BECK, C. J.

1. Under the pleadings, original and amended, which need not be set out or recited, the plaintiffs claim title to the land under the deeds and a sheriff's deed. The defendants claim as heirs of Richard Mann, who died in 1855. He held the fee-simple title to the land, and devised a life-estate therein to his wife, Eliza Mann, who, in 1858 or 1859, intermarried with one Spicer, and removed from the state, and never afterwards returned. It is alleged in defendant's answer and cross-bill that she died in 1881. We discover no evidence showing the date of her death, further than a witness for defendant testifies that he first heard of it in 1883 or 1884. January 3, 1865, a treasurer's tax-deed for the land was executed to John Van Horn, and recorded on the same day. It is executed under and pursuant to a tax-sale made December 2, 1861, to “F. Scarborough, for Jackson county.” The deed recites that the certificate of sale was assigned by “F. Scarborough, clerk of the board of supervisors,” to Booth and Graham, November 3, 1863, who soon after assigned it to Van Horn. The lands consisted of a quarter and an eighth of a section in different sections not contiguous. The tax-deed does not show that the land was sold in separate parcels, nor the separate price for which each was sold. Three other tax-deeds for parts of the land were subsequently executed upon tax-sales had after the sale upon the tax-deed first referred to was executed. These sales and deeds need be no more particularly referred to, as we find the consideration thereof is not necessary in order to decide the case. In 1860 one Sandford brought an action in attachment against Eliza Spicer, to whom a life-estate in the lands had been devised as above recited, and caused her interest to be levied upon. A judgment was recovered in the action, and the lands were sold in 1860 to William Graham, who assigned the sheriff's certificate to Van Horn, and a sheriff's deed was made to him for the land, June 5, 1865. Van Horn conveyed the land by deed of warranty, dated October 2, 1865, and filed the 6th of the same month to Isabel, who by deed of warranty, executed in 1868, conveyed the land to John Bash and Dennis Waggoner, the plaintiff. Bash is under guardianship, and is represented in the case by his guardian, Manderschied. The defendants make their answer a cross-bill, and pray that the treasurer's tax-deeds be declared void, or to have been executed for the use and benefit of defendants, upon grounds which will be stated hereafter; that plaintiffs be required to account to defendants for the rents and profits of the land; that their title be quieted, and that they be allowed such other and further relief as equity requires. They allege that Van Horn was Mrs. Spicer's agent, and had abundance of money in his hands to pay the taxes for which the land was sold, and it was his duty to pay them; and that the tax-sales and deeds were therefore fraudulent and void. Other grounds of objection to the tax-sales and deeds last made are stated, but, as we leave these sales and deeds out of the view we take of the case, these objections need not be discussed. In addition to the objection just stated as being urged against all of the tax-sales and deeds, the defendants insist that the one first made is fraudulent, illegal, invalid, for the reason that the land was bid in by the clerk of the board of supervisors for the county; that the clerk was forbidden to purchase land at tax-sales; and the county cannot acquire a tax-title. It is also alleged that Van Horn had an ample amount of money received on account of Mrs. Spicer in his hands when he bought the sheriff's certificate of the sale of the lands on the Sandford judgment, which he should have used in payment of the judgment, and that his purchase, therefore, was fraudulent. It is shown that the only title acquired by Van Horn upon that sale was the life-estate of Mrs. Spicer. By an amendment to the cross-bill defendants allege she died in 1884. Defendants allege in this cross-bill that plaintiffs had actual notice of the infirmities and frauds shown against plaintiffs' title. The plaintiffs in their answer to the cross-bill deny the allegations of fraud, and of other matters pleaded against the validity of their title, and plead the limitations of Code, § 902, providing that no action for the recovery of the real estate sold for the non-payment of taxes shall be maintained, unless it be brought within five years after the treasurer's deed was executed and recorded.

2. The title and interest acquired by Van Horn, through his purchase at the sheriff's sale under the Sandford judgment, was of a life-estate, and nothing more. The life-measuring duration of that estate has ended, and the remainder-man or the reversioner takes the estate, and now holds it as though there had been no life-estate, which now cuts no figure in the case, further than as constituting a support for the allegations of fraud committed by Van Horn in failing to pay the taxes, and in acquiring a tax-title while he had the life-estate. But these charges of fraud can only be made as to the last of those tax-deeds and sales. The first was made before he purchased the sheriff's certificate of sale of the land. The effect of the fraud upon the tax-title under the first deed we shall presently consider. We shall have no occasion to further consider the life-estate at one time held in...