Case ID: mich_91/html/0494-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "\n      Morse, C. J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

John M. Reynolds v. John M. Schaffer.
    
      Husband and wife — Competency as witness.
    
    In a suit by a husband for carnally debauching and knowing his wife, and alienating and destroying her affection for him, the wife is not a competent witness in his behalf; citing Mathews v. Yerex, 48 Mich. 361.
    Error to Gladwin. (Gobb, J.)
    Submitted on briefs April 22, 1892.
    
    Decided May 6, 1892.
    Case. Plaintiff brings error.
    Affirmed.
    The facts are stated in the opinion.
    
      James Van Kleeck, for appellant.
    
      F. L. Prindie (Cahill & Ostrander, of counsel), for defendant.
   Morse, C. J.

Plaintiff sued defendant for carnally debauching and knowing plaintiff's wife, Rhoda Reynolds, and alienating and destroying her affection for her husband. On the trial plaintiff offered his wife as a witness in his behalf. Upon • objection by defendant's counsel, the court below held that she was not a competent witness. The plaintiff also offered in evidence a-letter written to him by his said wife, previous to the wrongful acts of the’ defendant, to show the relation that,-/then existed between plaintiff and wife. This offer was rejected. No further evidence was offered by plaintiff, and the court directed a verdict for the defendant.

The direction was right. The case is ruled by Mathews v. Yerex, 48 Mich. 361, where it is held that the wife is not a competent witness for her husband in a suit of this kind. See, also, How. Stat. § 7546.

It is not necessary to determine whether the letter was admissible. It could have no force in the case, standing alone, without any proof of the criminal conversation.

The judgment is affirmed, with costs.

Long, Grant, and Montgomery, JJ., concurred. McGrath, J., took no part in the decision.