Barley v. Tipton
Barley v. Tipton
Opinion of the Court
delivered the opinion of the court.
The main effort in this case, on the part of the defendant, the failure of which is complained of, was to get in his proofs of the fraudulent intentions of Thomas Money in making the bill of sale to his sister, the plaintiff. The difficulties in the way of such a defence as this appear to be insurmountable. The execution, which defendant had in his hands, was against Thomas Money and Anna Money; but Thomas Money was dead, and had been long before the execution was renewed. So far as Thomas Money was concerned, the paper was a nullity, and this property could not be reached in that way. If the execution is to be treated as a valid one against Anna Money, and a justification is attempted to be set up under it in that view, then the fraud of Thomas Money is foreign to the case ; so that, in either view of the defence, no ground is laid for an attack upon the conveyance from Thomas Money to his sister, the plaintiff.
The instruction given by the court, that the bill of sale from Thomas to Catherine Money conveyed the title to the hogs levied on, was doubtless occasioned by the previous decisions of the court, not only in excluding all testimony tending to impeach this transaction for fraud, but all the documentary proof of a valid execution. The defendant was regarded in the light of a naked trespasser.
The instruction goes very far in taking from the jury all consideration of the title of Thomas Money, or of Anna Money, if she ever had any; but, under the circumstances and facts in evidence, we can not say that the instruction could possibly have injured the defendant.
So that, in every view of the case, the defendant stood before the court as a mere trespasser. The only defence which, under such circumstances, seemed to be available was, that the plaintiff had no title; but as he was not in a condition to dispute the validity of the transfer from Thomas Money to her, and offered no evidence to show that Anna Money ever had any title, and in fact conceded, by his attempted defence, that Thomas Money did have the title previous to his sale to the plaintiff, this ground was a very shadowy and narrow one, and was in truth utterly cut off by the mere proof of possession in the plaintiff.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- Barley & Wife v. Tipton
- Cited By
- 1 case
- Status
- Published