Wetzell v. Waters

• Decision Date: 31 July 1853
• Citation: 18 Mo. 396
• Parties: WETZELL, Defendant in Error, v. WATERS, et al., Plaintiffs in Error.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

18 Mo. 396

WETZELL, Defendant in Error,

v.WATERS, et al., Plaintiffs in Error.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

July Term, 1853.

1. In a suit for damages under the code, where the demand is not liquidated or the law does not fix the measure of damages, a writ of inquiry must be executed and the damages proved before final judgment upon a default; and it must appear from the record that there was an inquiry.

2. The defendant, in a suit brought by a public administrator, cannot require him to show that the facts exist which authorize him to administer.

3. The sureties in a bond of indemnity, given to a sheriff to procure the sale under execution of property belonging to a person other than the defendant in the execution, are liable as trespassers.

Error to Dade Circuit Court.

This was an action commenced by Wetzell, who was public administrator, and administrator of the estate of Thomas Bowles, deceased, to recover damages caused by the wrongful seizure and sale under execution of slaves belonging to the said estate. The petition stated that, on or about October 1, 1844, one Hudspeth, sheriff of Dade county, seized the slaves and was about to sell them under an execution in favor of T. & C. Waters against Robert M. Ward and Sally Bowles, when the plaintiff forbade the sale, claiming the slaves as belonging to the estate of his intestate, Thomas Bowles, deceased, whereupon said sheriff refused to sell the slaves unless he was indemnified therefor; that thereupon the defendants executed and delivered to the sheriff a bond of indemnity, in consequence of which he sold and delivered the slaves to the defendant, Waters, and one Caldwell, who had removed them beyond the limits of the state; and that the slaves belonged to the plaintiff as public administrator. There was an allegation of the value of each slave, and of the yearly value of their hire, amounting in the aggregate to $3,150, for which amount the plaintiff claimed damages.

A judgment was rendered against the defendants upon failure to answer, of which the following was the entry upon the record:

“The said defendants, Wilson, Latham and Sanders failing to appear and answer the plaintiff's petition and the said Waters having entered his appearance at the last term of this court by his attorney, and failing to answer or plead to said petition, judgment is rendered against defendants for want of an answer, and the said plaintiff not requiring a jury to assess his damages, the court does find that the said plaintiff have and recover from said defendants the sum of thirty-one hundred and fifty dollars for his damages sustained in consequence of the taking and detaining said negroes in plaintiff's petition mentioned.

It is therefore ordered, that the said plaintiff recover of and from the said defendants the said sum of thirty-one hundred and fifty dollars, assessed as aforesaid, together with his costs in this suit expended, and that he have execution therefor.”

The defendants appealed to this court.

F. P. Wright, for appellant.

I. The petition is insufficient. It is not averred that the plaintiff is public administrator, although it is only as such that he claims the slaves. No contingency is set forth in the petition authorizing him, as public administrator, to take possession of the slaves. (R. C. 109, § 8.) The petition does not state to what estate the slaves belonged. If this suit was upon the bond, as assumed by the court below, the petition was glaringly defective. (Wood v. Rainey, 15 Mo. 484.)

II...