Weber v. Redding
| Decision Date | 23 October 1928 |
| Docket Number | 24,920 |
| Parties | Weber v. Redding et al |
| Court | Indiana Supreme Court |
Rehearing Denied January 3, 1929.
1. ESTOPPEL---Pleading---Decree of Divorce---Decree Awarding Custody of Child.---In an action of habeas corpus for the possession and custody of a child which was awarded to the father in a divorce action, exceptions to the defendant's return to the writ, to the effect that the defendant was estopped to deny the validity of the divorce decree, did not present any question as to defendant's estoppel to deny the validity of the decree awarding him the custody of the child. p. 451.
2. HABEAS CORPUS---Questions Considered on Appeal.---Where every question presented by exceptions to the return to a writ of habeas corpus is presented by the motion for a new trial, the Supreme Court will not consider any error sought to be presented as to the action of the court in overruling such exceptions. p. 453.
3. DIVORCE---Jurisdiction---Defendant Nonresident---Substituted Service of Process.---The weight of authority is that in an action for divorce, where the defendant is a nonresident and does not appear, and process upon the defendant is by substituted service only, the jurisdiction of the court is limited to a determination of the status of the parties. p 454.
4. DIVORCE---Validity of Decree Awarding Custody of Child---Defendant and Child Nonresident---A decree in a divorce action, awarding custody of a child to the plaintiff was void where the defendant was not and had not been a resident of the state, and was not personally served with process or appeared to the action, and neither the defendant nor the child was in the state at or before the time of entering the decree. p. 454.
5. JUDGMENT---Res Judicata---Void Judgment.---Res judicata may not be founded upon a void judgment. p. 455.
6. JUDGMENT---Void Decree as to Custody of Child---Res Judicata.---Where the part of a decree in a divorce action awarding custody of a child was void, such decree would not support a plea of estoppel by judgment in a subsequent habeas corpus action for the custody of the child, and, therefore would not preclude the admission of evidence of petitioner's immorality at a time prior to the judgment in the divorce action. p. 455.
7. DIVORCE---Custody of Child---Change of Circumstances---Authority of Court in Another State to Order Change.---A court of a state other than the one in which the custody of a child was awarded to one of the parents in a divorce action, and in which state the child has been domiciled since before the beginning of the suit for divorce, has the judicial power, on a change of circumstances, when it finds that the best interests of the child require it, to make a new disposition of the child. p. 455.
8. PARENT AND CHILD---Custody of Child---Child's Welfare of First Importance---Parents' Rights Yield Thereto.---In determining the custody of a minor child, the welfare of the child is of first importance, and the rights of the parents must yield thereto. p. 455.
9. PARENT AND CHILD---Custody of Child---Rules Governing Court.---In a habeas corpus action for the possession and custody of a minor child, the court is not bound by the strict rules of law which bind the parties to an ordinary civil action; the decision of the court rests rather upon sound judicial discretion than upon hard and fast rules of law. p. 455.
10. PARENT AND CHILD---Appeal---Question Reviewed---On appeal from a decision of the court as to the custody of a minor child, the court of appeal merely determines whether there has been a judicial abuse of discretion. p. 455.
From Wells Circuit Court; William N. Ballou, Special Judge.
Action of habeas corpus by Loraine Weber against Harry E. Redding and others for the possession and custody of a minor child. From a judgment for defendants, the plaintiff appeals.
Affirmed.
Claycombe & Stump and Simmons, Dailey & Simmons, for appellant.
W. H. Eichhorn, Frank W. Gordon and John H. Edris, for appellees.
Travis, J. Martin, C.J. and Gemmill, J., do not agree with the opinion in the case of Wallace v. State, supra, upon authority of which this judgment is reversed.
This is an action by appellant against appellees for a writ of habeas corpus, to obtain the possession of Robert Ellsworth Redding, the son of the appellant and her former husband Harry E. Redding, appellee.
The subject of this inquiry was born March 23, 1919, eight years after the marriage of his parents. Appellee Redding was granted a divorce from appellant April 14, 1922, by the Court of Common Pleas, Franklin County, Ohio, upon substituted service of process by publication against his wife, defendant in the suit for divorce and appellant in this action. She was, before the bringing of the suit for divorce, a resident of and domiciled in Indiana. She did not appear to the suit for divorce, and was not within the State of Ohio from the beginning of the suit for divorce to the granting of the decree of divorce. All of this time she had the child with her in Indiana. At the time of the granting of the decree of divorce, the court decreed that the care, custody and control of the son were to be divided between the father and mother. At the time of the beginning of this action, the father had the custody and control of the child, but had placed him in the possession of appellee Ada Gordon, who was the sister of appellee Redding, and her husband, appellee Robert Gordon. Appellees, having such possession, control and custody of the child, refused to permit appellant to again take the absolute custody, control and possession of him, but offered to permit her to see her son at the home of appellees, the Gordons, at all reasonable times. The Gordons owned and lived upon a farm of 120 acres in Wells County. They were respectable people and bore a good reputation. They had all the conveniences of life to give the child, their nephew, every advantage, including education, necessary for his proper rearing. They had no child of their own. Appellee Redding was, and is, a resident of Columbus, Ohio. Appellant married ten days after she was divorced by her husband. She and her second husband reside in Indianapolis, and for aught shown by the evidence, she and her husband each bear a good reputation, and have a modern home. Appellant is also the mother of a son, the result of her second marriage.
The pleadings in the cause consist of the petition by appellant, the separate return of appellee Redding, and the joint return of Robert and Ada Gordon, appellees. Appellant filed exceptions to the return of appellee Redding, and to the joint return of appellees Gordon and Gordon. Appellant's petition for the writ alleges the birth of the child and his relationship to her and the appellees; the granting to appellee Redding of the divorce from appellant; the custody of the child in the appellees; the conspiring and confederating together of the appellees to retain the custody and possession of the child, and refusal to permit appellant thereafter to gain the custody and possession of him; the marriage of appellee Redding since the divorce, and his residence in Columbus, Ohio; Redding's voluntary relinquishment of the custody and care of the child to appellees Mr. and Mrs. Gordon; the fitness of the appellant to have the custody of the child, and her willingness and means to amply provide and care for him.
Appellees by their returns to the petition, admit all allegations of the petition, except appellant's fitness to have the care, custody and control of the child, and the custody of the child by appellees Robert and Ada Gordon; and allege the child was placed in the care and custody of the Gordons by appellee Redding, with instructions not to give possession and custody of the child to the appellant, but to permit her to visit the child at the home of the Gordons; and allege, in support of the refusal by Redding to permit appellant to again have the child, that the appellant is wholly unfit morally to have the care and custody of the child, and that the decree of the Ohio court, in relation to the custody of the child, is invalid and void for the reason that that court did not have jurisdiction of either the appellant or the child. The return by appellee Redding also alleges that before beginning this action for habeas corpus, appellant, on October 2, 1922, filed her petition in the Wells Circuit Court praying a writ of habeas corpus and custody of the child now before the court, based upon the decree of custody by the Ohio court with the decree of divorce of appellee Redding from appellant. In the former case, appellees here were defendants; they filed returns to the petition alleging that they were not bound by the Ohio court's decree of custody of this child, because the court did not have jurisdiction of the child, for the reason that the mother and child were residents of Indiana, and process was had on the appellant in the divorce action only by substituted service, and that neither she nor the child was before the court when the decree was rendered, but they were in Indiana, and that she did not appear to the action for divorce, and that thereby the decree for custody is void. The cause was submitted to the court for trial, evidence was heard, and the court found for the defendants and against the petitioner, and adjudged that the defendant Redding have the care and custody of the...
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