Case Name: Rawson against Dole, late sheriff of, &c.
Court: New York Supreme Court of Judicature
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1807-11
Citations: 2 Johns. 454
Docket Number: 
Parties: Rawson against Dole, late sheriff of, &c.
Judges: 
Reporter: Johnson's Reports
Volume: 2
Pages: 453–453

Head Matter:
Rawson against Dole, late sheriff of, &c.
In an action of debt against a sheriffforan escape of a • debtor in custody on a car. sa. no interest is allowed ; the original debt and damages is all that can be recovered. It seems where an ac ion on the case is bro’t, the jury may allow in terest in the assessment oi the damages, so as to give the plaintiff all that he has lost by the escape.
This was an action of debt for an escape, and the only questison was, whether interest is recoverable as damages, in an action of debit, for the escape of one in custody on a ca. sa.

Opinion:
Spencer, J.
delivered the opinion of the court. The common law remedy to proceed against a sheriff for an escape, by action on the case, has been holden not to be taken away by the statute, enabling the party, in whose favour an execution issues, against the body of his debtor, upon his escape to maintain an action for the debt and damages for which he was committed.
If an action on the case had been brought, it might have been inquired, what was lost by the escape, and the jury might have given such damages as they supposed the party had sustained; but in the action of debt, every inquiry of that kind is improper, for the statute has fixed the extent of the sheriff's liability, that is, for the original debt and damages recovered. As the defendant could go into no circumstances of mitigation, the plaintiff must be confined to the precise amount of the original judgment, with costs; and this is conformable to the case of Bonafous v. Walker.
Judgment for the plaintiff'
2 Term, 126.