Case ID: ohio_7/html/0277-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Judge Hitchcock", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Hugh Evans, for the use of D. S. Bell, v. Michael Instine.
    In attachment against an absconding debtor, who has not entered an appearance, and where the attachment was served upon property not owned by the defendant, but withdrawn from the attachment on the suit of a third person, the proceedings are coram non judice.
    
    Reserved in the county of Champaign.
    This is an action of debt. The declaration contains two counts:
    1. Upon a judgment rendered in the quarterly court of Monongalia county, in the commonwealth of Virginia, at the suit of Evans v. Instine, on November 11, 1802, for the sum of fifteen dollars damages, and five dollars and fifty-two cents costs of suit.
    2. Upon a judgment rendered in the same court, on the *same day, and between the same parties, in favor of the plaintiff, for eighteen dollars damages, and five dollars forty-two cents costs.
    To this the defendant pleaded nil debet and two special pleas in bar, which it is unnecessary to notice.
    On the trial of the case the plaintiff offered in evidence two transcripts, purporting to.be copies of proceedings in the quarterly court of Monongalia county. From these it appeared that the plaintiff, on November 8, 1802, procured to be issued two writs of attachment against the defendant, by one Nathan Hall, a justice of the peace, first having made oath that the defendant was an absent debtor. These writs of attachment were on the same day exr ecuted upon .personal property and returned. On the eleventh day of the same month, judgments by default were rendered for the same sums as stated in the declaration.
    ■ To show that the property attached had not been appropriated to satisfy the judgments, the plaintiff next introduced a transcript of a proceeding in chancery, commenced on December 15, 1811, in the name of Philip Huffman, against the said Hugli Evans, in which Huffman claimed as his own, the property levied upon in virtue of the attachments, and sought to enjoin Evans from selling the same to satisfy the judgments against Instine.' On final hearing, the property was found to be in Huffman, and a perpetual injunction decreed.
    The plaintiff having closed his testimony, the defendant moved the court to overrule the evidence and direct a nonsuit, which was done accordingly.
    Whereupon the plaintiff moved to set aside the nonsuit, and for a new trial.
    D. S. Bell, for plaintiff.
    Hamilton, for defendant.
   Judge Hitchcock

delivered the opinion of the court.

The evidence in this case shows that two judgments were rendered against the defendant, by default, in the quarterly court of Monongalia county, Virginia. It is presumed that the proceedings which resulted in the rendition of these judgments were in conformity to the laws of that commonwealth. *But although these judgments were rendered, still no process had been previously served upon the defendant; he had not appeared in court, nor had any property of his'been seized in attachment. Without inquring as to the effect of a judgment in foreign attachment, where the property of a defendant has been taken in virtue of the writ, we are clear in the opinion that where the property of a stranger has been levied upon, such service does not so far give any court jurisdiction as that a judgment rendered can be of any effect.

The motion is overruled.