Case ID: ga_48/html/0265-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "' McCay, Judge.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

*Southern Express Company, plaintiff in error, vs. Elizabeth Dufrey, defendant in error.
    (Atlanta,
    January Term, 1873.)
    1. Ejectment — Evidence.—The statements of the local agents of an express company to the grantor, pending negotiations between said company and said grantor, for said company to release the grantor’s son, who was under arrest for embezzlement, upon the execution of a deed conveying certain land to the company, are admissible upon the trial of an action of ejectment by the company for said land. (R.)
    2. Deed — Consideration—Duress.—A mother made a deed to procure the release of her son from arrest on a charge of felony, to-wit: for embezzling money in his hands as the messenger of an express company. The expressed consideration of the contract was the repayment by her of the money embezzled by the son; but it was in proof that the son was under arrest and in chains,' and the grantee in the deed agreed to release the son and stop the proceedings, though he expressly refused to settle the prosecution, saying he could not control the public authorities. The son was released, and the proceedings stopped:
    Held, that the deed was illegal and void.
    Deed. Consideration. Duress. Before Judge Green. Spalding Superior Court. February Term, 1872.
    
      The Southern Express Company, brought complaint against Elizabeth Duffey for a lot of land situated in the city of Griffin, and for mesne profits from March 13th, 1869. To the declaration was annexed, as an abstract of title, a statemept of a deed purporting to have been made by defendant on the 13th of March, 1869, conveying the premises in dispute to plaintiff.
    The defendant pleaded that she was not in possession of any land in the city of Griffin, to which the plaintiff had a legal title; that the pretended deed under which the plaintiff claimed was obtained by duress, fraud and misrepresentations; that said deed was executed for no consideration; that it was made for the purpose of compromising a felony; that plaintiff, under its charter, was not authorized to hold real estate.
    The evidence made the following case:
    In April 1866, W. J. Duffey, the son of the defendant, was in the employ of plaintiff as messenger on the Macon & Western Railroad. Whilst acting in this capacity, he appropriated *to his own use moneys intrusted to his care to be delivered at Atlanta and Macon, Georgia, to the amount of $1,766 30, which sum the plaintiff was compelled to pay. He escaped to Texas, but was brought back to Atlanta by the superintendent of the southern division of plaintiff, under a requisition from the Governor of Georgia upon the Governor of Texas. He arrived at Atlanta in irons. After his arrest in Texas, propositions were made by the officers and agents of plaintiff to the defendant, that if she would pay the amount of money he had appropriated, he should be released, stating, at the same time, that they could not, under the law, settle the criminal prosecution, as that matter would have to be left to the civil authorities. These negotiations were pending for some six weeks. W. J. Duffey was arrested in February, 1869. At length, on March 13th, 1869, the defendant executed to the plaintiff a deed to the premises in dispute, purporting to have been made in consideration of $2,126 94, the principal and interest due to plaintiff by her son. Plaintiff gave to defendant a receipt in. full for said indebtedness. W. J. Duffey was then released.
    The jury returned a verdict in favor of the defendant. Whereupon the plaintiff moved for a new trial upon the following grounds:
    1st. Because the Court erred in charging the jury as follows: “That if you believe from the evidence that the agents of the company went to Mrs. Duffey and told her that W. J. Duffey was in the power of the company, and that they could send him to the penitentiary, and by doing so, so overwhelmed her as to put her in duress, so as to prevent her free and voluntary action in the making of the deed, and the plaintiff afterwards book advantage of this, and received a benefit by it in the making of this deed, then the same is void, and the plaintiff is not entitled to recover.”
    2d. Because the Court erred in the following charge: “That if Mrs. 'Duffey made this deed understanding it to be for the purpose of procuring the release of her son, W. J. Duffey, and, the other party had reason to believe she so understood it, the deed is void.”
    *3d. Because the Court erred in the following charge: “Duress consists in any illegal imprisonment, or legal imprisonment used for an illegal purpose, or threats of bodily or other harm, or other means amounting to or tending to coerce the will of another, and actually inducing him to do an act contrary to his free will,” the same being inapplicable to the case; and in the same connection, in charging as follows: “That duress might exist when the free will of the party is restrained; or her consent induced by threats or other acts. That if such were the facts in the case, the deed procured under such a state of facts was void.”
    The motion for a new trial was overruled and the plaintiff excepted, upon each of the aforesaid grounds.
    PEEPEES & Stewart; E. W. Becic, for plaintiff in error.
    E. W. Hammond; Boynton & Dismuke, for defendant in error.
    -.1st. Charge of Court on duress not error: Code, sections 2595 2710 2714.
    ' • 2d. Deed void: _ Sections 2999, 2703, 2707 ; 39 Ga. R., 85.
    _ 3d., Verdict is right; no necessity for a new trial: 10 Ga. R.,' 429; 14 Ibid., 153; 15 Ibid., 155; 16 Ibid., 368; 30 Ibid., 278, 958. Judicial discretion not abused.
    
      
      Duress. — See the principal case cited in Wheaton v. Ansley, 71 Ga. 39; Ency. Dig. Ga. Rep., vol. 4, p. 720.
      Compounding Felony. — See the principal case cited in note to Chandler v. Johnson. 39 Ga. S3: Encv. Dio-. Ga Ren., vol 3. n urs
    
   ' McCay, Judge.

There is really but one point in this case. The admission of the statements of the two minor local agents of the company, even if not authorized by law, was immaterial, as the case is, in our judgment, with the defendant below, even on the evidence of -the plaintiff. Nor were these statements improperly admitted. They were a part of the negotiations and communications between Mrs. Duffey and the principal authorized superintendent, and- the whole transaction could not have been fairly before the Court with these statements left out. They were re-, ferred to in the talk between the superintendent and Mrs. Duffey’s agent, and are fairly a part of the res gestae. They' are, besides, very unimportant, since they *are, in the main, only appeals to her, based on facts and consequences known to all, and only show what all the other testimony shows, that Mrs. Duffey acted on the idea that she was releasing her son.

The main point in the case, is whether, according to the evidence, the making of this deed, was an act coming within that section of our Revised Code, section 2999, which provides,, that “whilst a party injured may lawfully receive pay for the damage he has received from a crime, and may make a contract therefor, yet if any attempt is made to satisfy the public offense or to suppress a prosecution therefor, it vitiates the entire agreement” Jeff. Duffey was under arrest, was in Atlanta, brpught back from Texas under a requisition from the Governor, and was in chains; such is the testimony. If he was under legal arrest, then it is clear to us, and the idea is fairly supported by the authorities, that the agreement to release him, to stop the then proceedings, was within the statute: Section 2999 of the Code. Indeed, we do not see how the parties could agree to any thing else that would gd to satisfy the public offense. They could not prevent a new proceeding; anybody could sue out the warrant, if he had the evidence, and if the custody of Jeff, was legal, the agent of the express company agreed to do more than ne could have done if the officers of the law had done their duty. If the agreement to release a man under arrest and stop' that proceeding'is not an attempt to suppress a prosecution, we are at a loss to put a state of facts that does make a case within che rule. If this arrest was illegal, if the agents of the express company had this boy in their own custody, and could let him go or not at their pleasure, then this deed was the clear result of duress, since it was made to release the child of the grantor from illegal imprisonment. A man’s child stands, under the law, in the same situation as himself in such cases.

Altogether we think this deed void in every aspect of the evidence, and we affirm the judgment.

Judgment affirmed.