Wiles v. Young
| Decision Date | 24 March 1934 |
| Citation | 68 S.W.2d 114 |
| Parties | WILES v. YOUNG. |
| Court | Tennessee Supreme Court |
Appeal from Circuit Court, Davidson County; A. G. Rutherford, Judge.
Suit by Marvin Wiles against B. D. Young. From a judgment affirming a judgment of dismissal, plaintiff appeals.
Reversed and remanded.
C. Wade Wilkes, of Nashville, for appellant.
Trabue, Hume & Armistead, of Nashville, for appellee.
This suit was instituted before a magistrate to recover damages for injuries to plaintiff's automobile alleged to have been occasioned by the negligent operation of defendant's automobile. The magistrate dismissed the suit and, upon appeal, the magistrate's judgment was affirmed by the circuit court.
The case was decided on the pleadings in the circuit court. The defendant's plea set out that his car and plaintiff's car had a collision; that Miss Ethel Cooley was an occupant of the car driven by plaintiff; that she received injuries in the accident; that she brought suit against plaintiff and defendant both; that she recovered against both; and that plaintiff paid "his pro rata part" of the judgment. The plea averred that the present suit was for damage suffered by plaintiff's car in the accident mentioned, and that the judgment in the suit of Miss Cooley against plaintiff and defendant was a judicial determination that plaintiff was guilty of negligence that proximately caused or contributed to the collision. Defendant set up the judgment in the former suit and the proportionate payment of said judgment by plaintiff as an estoppel or bar to the maintenance of the present suit by the plaintiff. Plaintiff filed a replication to this plea in which he submitted that neither the former adjudication nor the proportionate payment of the judgment was a bar to the prosecution of the present suit, since there had been no former controversy or litigation between the plaintiff and the defendant herein. The court below was of opinion that the replication was bad, sustained the plea, and dismissed the suit.
The facts developed in the suit of Miss Cooley against the parties hereto are not made to appear any further than indicated by the above excerpts from pleadings in this suit. We think that the trial judge reached an erroneous conclusion. It is true both plaintiff and defendant were parties to the former suit and the judgment therein was an adjudication that the plaintiff here was guilty of negligence. That is to say, plaintiff was adjudged to be guilty of negligence with respect to Miss Cooley — of a breach of duty toward Miss Cooley. It was not adjudged in the former suit, so far as this record shows, that plaintiff was guilty of any negligence with respect to defendant — of a breach of duty toward defendant.
The general rule is that parties to a judgment are not bound by it in subsequent controversies between each other, unless they were adversaries in the suit in which the judgment was rendered. 15 R. C. L. 1013; Freeman on Judgments (5th Ed.) § 424.
"Hence a judgment against several defendants is usually not conclusive as between themselves in respect to their rights and liabilities toward each other, unless the defendants contest an issue with each other, either upon the pleadings between themselves and the plaintiffs or upon cross-pleadings...
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