Case Name: James King versus Daniel Goodwin
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1819-07
Citations: 15 Tyng 63
Docket Number: 
Parties: James King versus Daniel Goodwin.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 16
Pages: 54–55

Head Matter:
James King versus Daniel Goodwin.
A pluries execution, issued after the judgment debtor had been committed on an alias, was void; and an extent upon land of the debtor, he having been first liberated by the creditor, conveyed no title.
Entry sur disseisin. The demandant, having recovered a judgment in this Court, November term, 1814, against the tenant, sued out his alias execution, and the tenant was committed to prison thereon. Afterwards discovering sufficient real estate of the tenant, wherewith to satisfy his judgment, he sued out a pluries [ *64 ] execution, and having * given the tenant permission to go at large, he extended the same on the demanded premises.
The action coming on for trial before Wilde, J., at the last October term, at Taunton, the judge directed a nonsuit, with a view to bring before the Court, for their determination, the question of the regu larity of the demandant’s proceedings, in suing out and extending the said pluries execution.
W. Baylies, for the demandant.
L. Wheaton, for the tenant.

Opinion:
Curia.
We are all of opinion, that the debtor being committed to prison in execution, and liberated, therefrom by the creditor, the judgment was satisfied; and the pluries execution, upon which the levy on the land was made, was void. It seems to be a settled principle at common law, that when a judgment debtor is taken in execution, and is afterwards discharged with the consent of the creditor, no action can be maintained upon the same judgment . The reason is as strong against the issuing of another execution upon the same judgment; for the judgment is in fact satisfied, and there is nothing to support an execution. This pluries must have been issued incautiously ; for by the return of the alias, without which there was no authority to issue the pluries, it must have been seen that the course of the law was finished by a commitment of the debtor. The nonsuit must stand .
Judgment for the tenant.
4 Burr. 2482, Vigers vs. Aldrich. —1 D. & E. 557, Jaques vs. Withy.
[Forster vs. Fuller, 6 Mass. 58. By the act of 1819, c. 94, § 2., the release of the debtor from imprisonment does not discharge the debt. See also the act of 1788 c. 16, § 4. —Ed.]