Case Title: Stoskopf v. Stoskopf

Citation: 173 Kan. 244, 245 P.2d 1180

Docket Number: 

State: kansas

Court: Kansas Supreme Court

Date: 1952-07-03T00:00:00Z

Document:
173 Kan. 244 (1952)
245 P.2d 1180
A. EMERSON STOSKOPF, Appellant,
v.
JOHN F. STOSKOPF, JR., Appellee.
No. 38,625

Supreme Court of Kansas.
Opinion filed July 3, 1952.
W.R. Martin, of Wichita, argued the cause, and George B. Collins, C.L. Williams, Oliver H. Hughes, and Kenneth W. Pringle, all of Wichita, and Melvin O. Nuss and Vernon L. Nuss, both of Great Bend, were with him on the briefs for the appellant.
Louis R. Gates, of Kansas City, argued the cause, and Barton Carothers, of Great Bend, was with him on the briefs for the appellee.
The opinion of the court was delivered by
HARVEY, C.J.:
This was a suit in equity in which plaintiff sought to establish and enforce an alleged oral agreement between himself and defendant respecting the acquiring and operating of a certain oil and gas lease. Issues were formed by the pleadings and the trial was had by the court, at which testimony was given and documentary evidence received for three days. The evidence was sharply in conflict as to whether the oral agreement relied upon by plaintiff was ever made. The court considered all of the evidence and made findings of fact and conclusions of law and rendered judgment for defendant.
Plaintiff filed a motion for a new trial, one ground of which was the alleged perjury of defendant. At the hearing of that motion the plaintiff called numerous witnesses, most of whom had testified at the trial. While the court might have sustained defendant's objections to this testimony on the ground that it was not newly discovered, or that it was otherwise incompetent or immaterial, the court did not do so, but heard all the evidence tendered on plaintiff's behalf. After considering this evidence the motion for a new trial was overruled, and plaintiff has appealed.
*245 The sole question presented here is the contention upon the part of appellant that a motion for a new trial should have been granted because of the perjury of defendant.
It is well settled in our law and elsewhere that the triers of the facts are the exclusive judges of the credibility of witnesses and the weight to be given to their testimony. In 64 C.J. 348, the rule is thus stated:
In Shellabarger v. Nafus, 15 Kan. 547 (1875), it was held:
In Walls v. Zinc Co., 113 Kan. 700, 701, 216 Pac. 308, it was said:
In Greiner v. Greiner, 130 Kan. 333, 335, 286 Pac. 219, after summarizing the evidence, the court said:
In State v. Martin, 155 Kan. 801, 805, 130 P.2d 601, the court said:
See, also, 53 Am. Jur. 780, § 1123:
And in 58 Am. Jur. 491, it is said:
Indeed, our statute (G.S. 1949, 60-2929) so provides. It reads:
This court passes only upon the question of whether there was sufficient competent evidence to sustain the judgment of the trial *246 court. In this case it is not contended the evidence on defendant's behalf, if believed by the court, was insufficient to sustain the judgment of the court. The result is that the appeal presents no legal question to this court for review.
The appeal, therefore, is dismissed.