Wooley v. Drew
| Decision Date | 18 October 1882 |
| Court | Michigan Supreme Court |
| Parties | WOOLEY v. DREW and another. |
The rule that a decree will not be reversed for mere preponderance of testimony where it was granted on proofs taken in open court so that the trial judge could observe the demeanor of witnesses does not apply where the proofs of the prevailing party alone show that it should not have been made.
Where a conveyance of land was obtained in exchange for property of about half its value by taking advantage of the grantor's ignorance and unfounded apprehensions that if he did not convey it would be taken on a judgment, the transaction was held to be unconscionable and the conveyance was set aside.
Appeal from Jackson.
Gibson Parkinson & Ashley, for defendants.
Complainant comes into court to compel the defendant Elizabeth P. Drew to convey a certain 80 acres of land, which complainant conveyed to her in 1879 under an alleged promise to reconvey in two years thereafter.
The complainant's theory is that a certain slander suit was pending against her husband; that he had previously conveyed the farm to her; that defendant John F. Drew "excited complainant into the belief that she would lose her homestead, unless she made a conveyance of it to Mr Drew;" and that in consequence thereof the conveyance was made. The defendants deny all this and claim that the sale made was in good faith for a valuable consideration, and made at the earnest solicitation of complainant and her husband. The case was heard upon the pleadings, and proofs taken in open court, and the bill dismissed. The complainant appealed.
If the complainant's theory is sustained, the case comes within Barns v. Brown, 32 Mich. 146 and she is entitled to relief. Where the witnesses have been examined in open court and the case is one that must be governed by the credibility of the witnesses for the respective parties and the weight to be given their testimony, the conclusion arrived at by the court below should not, upon what might seem to the court a mere preponderance of testimony be overturned. This case does not however come within that class, where the appearances of the witnesses upon the stand can be given any decisive effect, as the transaction, when reviewed upon the defendant's testimony, shows that it was one so fraudulent and barefaced that it could not be permitted to stand. The complainant and her husband were uneducated, and they seemed to have had a good deal of trouble with their neighbors, while the defendant John F. Drew seems to have had, or claimed to have, considerable knowledge pertaining to legal matters. The complainant and her husband at the time the conveyance was made, evidently were afraid, that because of the slander suit they were in some danger of losing this farm, and that the plaintiff in that suit and other parties were conspiring against them to cheat them out of their property. Whether these ideas were suggested to them for the first time by John F. Drew as complainant claims or not we do not deem it necessary to determine. It is certain that defendants did not make any effort to allay these fears, or to assure complainants that their property could not be attached in the slander suit, or they be enjoined from transferring their farm because of the pendency thereof. On the contrary these impressions were strengthened and the trade consummated within a very short time, a few days after being first mentioned or thought of between the parties.
The complainant's farm contained 80 acres, with suitable buildings and improvements thereon of the value of $3,200, upon which there was an incumbrance of $100, and it had also been leased for one year, from April, 1879, the rent to be paid in a share of the crops.
When the complainant and her husband at the house of defendants talked of selling, the defendant John F. offered to give them for their farm a mortgage held by his wife upon a certain house and lot in the city of Jackson which defendants say the complainant and her husband were ready and willing to accept, and wished to have the necessary papers executed at once, but which defendants put off for a couple of days to enable them to make an examination of complainant's title to the farm. On making this examination the next day, they for the first time ascertained that there was an outstanding mortgage thereon for $100, and they also, before the trade was consummated, learned that the farm had been leased for one year with the privilege of an additional year.
The parties met the following day, and defendants say they did not then wish to make the exchange, yet the defendant John F had procured the necessary blank form of conveyance, and after some...
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