Strobel v. Gormley
Strobel v. Gormley
Opinion of the Court
“R. E. Gormley, superintendent of banks for the State of Georgia, in charge and possession of Bank of Thomas-ville, in liquidation,” procured a judgment for $2,541.59 against F. A. Strobel. The execution issued on this judgment was levied on certain personal property as the property of the defendant. Mrs. Modena Strobel, wife of F. A. Strobel, filed her claim to said property, and upon the trial of the claim case on January 30, 1934, before the court without the intervention of a jury, the property was found subject to the levy. The claimant’s motion for a new trial was overruled, and she excepted. It appearing from the entry of levy on the execution that the property levied on was found in the possession of the defendant in fi. fa., the claimant assumed the burden of proof. We quote from the brief of evidence as follows: “The claimant introduced the following documentary evidence : Bill of sale covering the property now. in question, from Frank A. Strobel, defendant in fi. fa., to Mrs. Modena Strobel, claimant, dated 17th day of February, 1932, and recorded in office of clerk of the superior court, Thomas county, Georgia, on 29th of February, 1932. Also execution issued from Thomas superior court on the 21st of October, 1932, in favor of Ethel Dekle Strobel, and against the defendant in fi. fa., Frank A. Strobel, together with the sheriff’s entry of levy thereon covering the same personal property now in question; also certified copy of the claim affidavit and bond filed in Thomas superior court on the 28th of November,
The brief of evidence recites that the plaintiff in execution introduced the following documentary evidence: 1. “M. fa. issued against F. A. Strobel in favor of E. E. Gormley, superintendent of banks for the State of Georgia, in charge of Bank of Thomasville, in liquidation, on the 29th day of September, 1932, together with the entry of levy of the sheriff thereon and all other entries.” 2. “Tax returns of F. A. Strobel in Thomas county, Georgia, for years 1930 and 1931, said tax returns showing that the property, or part of the property in question, was returned by F. A. Strobel in Thomas county, Georgia, for taxation, and not returned by Mrs. F. A. Strobel.” 3. “Application of Mrs. Modena Strobel for homestead setting aside sixteen hundred dollars worth of property to Mrs. Modena Strobel, which said application alleges that F. A. Strobel refuses and declines to make application for homestead; also the schedule of property set aside in the homestead, a list of the creditors, and the order of the ordinary approving same.” 4. “The two notes on which judgment was obtained, and upon which the fi. fa. as levied in this case was issued, as follows: One note dated January 18th, 1932, due April 18th, 1932, for the principal sum of $595, and the second note, dated December 15th, 1931, due March 2d, 1931, for the principal sum of $1,585, both of which notes bear the following clauses: And for the further consideration of $1 to me in hand paid, and for the purpose of securing the payment of this note, I hereby transfer, assign, and convey to the owner of this note so much of my homestead and exemption as will pay this note in full . . , and I hereby direct the trustee in bankruptcy to deliver to the owner of said note a sufficient amount of property or money claimed or set apart as exempt, to pay off this indebtedness, and this shall be his authority therefor. I hereby waive and renounce for myself and family all homestead and exemption rights I or they may have under the constitution and laws of this State, or any other State of the United States, including the waiver of exemption allowed in the United States bankruptcy laws, as against this debt or the renewal thereof.”
Randolph A. Jones, of counsel for the plaintiff in execution, testified as follows: “The said levy was dismissed because there was no affidavit filed that the property was subject to levy, the said F. A. Strobel having on the 17th day of May made application to R. S. Burch, ordinary of Thomas county, Georgia, for a homestead on said property, and said application having been granted on the 17th day of May, 1933. For this reason it was necessary, or we deemed it advisable, to file an affidavit stating that the property levied upon was subject to levy. Therefore it was necessary to dismiss the first levy, and file an affidavit and relevy on said property. I instructed the sheriff that the levy was being dismissed for the sole purpose of making another levy, and requested that he make another levy on the same property. Another levy was made, as shown on the fi. fa., but between the time the first levy was made there was considerable property disposed of by the defendant in execution, and for this reason the second entry of levy is somewhat different from the first entry of levy. There was no money obtained under the first levy, and no advantage was obtained by the plaintiff in execution. The property was left in the possession of F. A. Strobel, and there was no harm done whatever to F. A. Strobel by the dismissal referred to.55
Sheriff G. E. Davis, sworn for the plaintiff in execution, testified: “Mr. Jones instructed me at the time that they were dismissing the levy for the purpose of filing an affidavit, and that we would then relevy on said property. Mr. Jones told me then that I would have to go to StrobeFs office and make another levy. Yes, I did make a second levy. After making the first levy the property was left in Mr.- StrobeFs possession, and it has been left in his possession since the second levy. It has been in his possession at all times since the first and second levies. Mr. Strobel had a Chrysler automobile when I made the first levy. He did not have it when
The brief of evidence recites that: “ On the 29th day of September, 1932, judgment was obtained on said potes for the sum of $2, 541.59, and execution issued on said debt against F. A. Strobel and in favor of E. E. Gormley, superintendent of banks for the State of Georgia.”
The first special ground of the motion for a new trial avers that the court erred in admitting in evidence the “fi. fa. issued against F. A. Strobel in favor of E. E. Gormley, superintendent of banks for the State of Georgia, in charge and possession of the Bank of Thomasville, in liquidation, on the 29th day of September, 1932, together with the entry of levy of the sheriff thereon and all other levies.” The ground continues: “Movant objected to the admission of such evidence at the time the same was offered, and did' then and there urge the following grounds of objection thereto, to wit: Because the said fi. fa. as offered in evidence contained an. entry of levy upon the same property now in question, and said entry of levy was subsequently dismissed by attorneys for plaintiff in fi. fa. with the following entry: "The within levy is this day dismissed by plaintiff in execution. This 3rd day of June, 1933. Alexander & Jones, by Eandolph A. Jones, attorneys for plaintiff in execution.” “Movant objected to the admission of such evidence upon the ground that the dismissal of said levy upon personal property without any explanation thereof by the plaintiff in execution amounted to a satisfaction of the debt so far as the claimant, a third party, might be affected by it.”
The Civil Code (1910), § 6047, reads: “A levy upon personal property sufficient to pay the debt, unaccounted for, is prima facie evidence of satisfaction to the extent of the value of the property, and the dismissal of such levy, unexplained, is an abandonment of the lien so far as third parties are concerned.” After discussing,
In the third special ground it is averred that the court erred in admitting in evidence the “application of Mrs. Modena Strobel for homestead setting aside sixteen hundred dollars worth of property to Mrs. Modena Strobel, which said application alleges that F. A. Strobel refuses and declines to make application for homestead, a list of creditors, and the order of the ordinary approving same.” The objection 'was that the evidence was irrelevant and immaterial, and “movant’s claim was filed and based upon the bill of sale already in evidence, and not upon the homestead.” We think that the fact that Mrs. Modena Strobel procured a homestead “on the property in question” more thair a year after her husband had made her a bill of sale to the same property is material upon the question of the bona fides of the sale, and we hold that the evidence was admissible.
It appears from the fourth special' ground that the claimant interposed the following objection to the introduction in evidence of the two notes upon which judgment was procured and execution issued in the main case: “Movant objected to the admission of such evidence upon the ground that the said notes contained provisions relative to proceedings in bankruptcy cases which were entirely irrelevant, and that even though the judgment and execution in the instant case were based upon the notes, the transfer and assignment contained in said notes of defendant’s homestead and exemption did not and could not convey to plaintiff any title to a homestead not then in existence, it not being shown at the time said notes were executed that defendant was in fact entitled to any benefits under the homestead and the exemption laws of this State,
The last special ground avers that the court erred in admitting the testimony of Randolph A. Jones (hereinbefore set out) designed to explain the levj1-, the dismissal thereof, and the relevy. “A levy upon property, or the dismissal of a levy, may be accounted for or explained, as any other facts may be explained.” Rawson v. Davis, supra. Waiving the fact that the objection was to “all of the testimony” of Jones and some of it is unquestionably admissible, we hold that it was admissible to account for the levy and explain its dismissal.
We shall now consider the general grounds of the motion for a new trial. In his brief, counsel for plaintiff in error states that “the claimant . . based her claim on the bill of sale, and not upon the homestead.” Aside from this statement, however, it would appear that, in view of the waiver of homestead in the notes declared upon, and upon which the judgment and execution in the main case were based, the homestead subsequently granted was not good against the execution of plaintiff in execution. See Hughey v. Peacock, 115 Ga. 735 (42 S. E. 44). Certainly, by his evidence, the plaintiff in execution attacked the bona fides of the bill of sale upon which the claimant relies. In the case of Booher v. Worrill, 57 Ga. 235, 238, Judge Bleckley, speaking for the court, said: “Where man and wife are acting together, on the same side of a question of property, they are under temptation to do themselves more than justice. What is secured to the one is apt to be shared by the other. . . Contracts between them which retain in the family property that would otherwise go to satisfy honest creditors, are to be subjected to strict scrutiny—a vigilant judicial police. When a creditor challenges such a contract for fraud, slight evidence will change the onus, and cast on the conjugal pair the duty of manifesting the genuineness and good faith of the transaction by such evidence as will satisfy, or ought to satisfy, an honest jury.” In the case of Gill v. Willingham, 156 Ga. 728 (120 S. E. 108), where a wife claimed the property levied on under a deed from her
It appears from the record' in the case at bar that the property levied on (with the exception of a Chrysler automobile) was in StrobePs office. The sheriff testified: “At the time I made this first levy, I left the property in StrobePs office, in his care and charge; I did not move it.” Was' not the burden upon the claimant to explain the possession of the property in her husband after he had made her the bill of sale to it? We think so; and yet the record discloses no explanation whatever of such possession. It may be observed in passing that the record in this case fails to show what consideration, if any, was- given by Mrs. Modena Strobel for the conveyance of the property covered by her bill of sale. Again, the record fails to explain why the claimant applied for and procured a homestead on the property in controversy long after the date and recording of her bill of sale covering it. The facts of the case, in so far as they are ascertainable from the record, have been already set out, and we see no occasion to discuss them further. “Fraud may not be presumed, but, being in itself subtle, slight circumstances may be sufficient to carry conviction of its existence.” Civil Code (1910), § 4626. As has already been shown, this rule is peculiarly applicable in transactions between husband and
■Judgment affirmed.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.