Case ID: me_13/html/0438-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Per Curiam.\n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Samuel Duncan vs. Gilman Sylvester.
    If the plaintiff, in an action of assumpsit, appeal from a judgment on a verdict in his favor, at the Court of Common Pleas, for less than twenty dollars,, and on trial in the S. J. Court, he recover more then twenty but less than one hundred dollars; under the stat. of 1820, c!i. 444, the plaintiff is entitled to-full costs in the G. C. Pleas, and the defendant to costs in the S. J. Court.
    This was an action of assumpsit, commenced before the passing of the act prohibiting appeals from the Court of Common Pleas in civil actions. The damages demanded exceeded one hundred dollars. On the trial in the Court of Common Pleas, the plaintiff recovered but nominal damages, and he appealed to the S. J. Court, where on trial, he obtained a verdict for twenty-eight dollars.
    
      W. G. Crosby, for the defendant,
    cited the stat. of 1829, ch. 444, being the “ act additional to an act to establish a Court of Common Pleas,” and contended, that the plaintiff was not entitled to recover any costs, but in the Court of Common Pleas, and there but one quarter part as much costs as damages. If there had been no appeal, the plaintiff could have had no more, and he is not entitled to increase his costs by any transactions in the S. J. Court. As he did not recover one hundred dollars, we are entitled to recover our costs in the S. J. Court by the provisions of that statute.
    
      Thayer, for the plaintiff.
   Per Curiam.

Under the statute cited by the counsel for the defendant, in a case not coming within the exceptions, the plaintiff appeals from a verdict in his favor at the peril of losing his own costs and paying costs to the defendant, unless he recover in this Court over one hundred dollars. In the case before us, the appeal vacated the judgment of the Court of Common Pleas entirely, and the verdict in this Court shows how much the defendant was indebted to the plaintiff. As the amount found to be due is more than twenty and less than one hundred dollars, the plaintiff is entitled to full costs in the Court of Common Pleas, and the defendant to costs in this Court.