Case Name: Sylvester Johnson vs. Camden H. Babcock
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1864-09
Citations: 8 Allen 583
Docket Number: 
Parties: Sylvester Johnson vs. Camden H. Babcock.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 90
Pages: 583–584

Head Matter:
Sylvester Johnson vs. Camden H. Babcock.
A heifer is exempt from attachment, if the debtor has no other animal of that kind.
A sale on execution of a heifer which is exempt from attachment, after notice that her owner claims her as exempt, will pass no title to the purchaser.
Replevin of a heifer. It was agreed, in the superior court, that the plaintiff bought the animal in the summer of 1862, when she was but two days old, and kept her until December 1863, when she was taken from his possession by the defendant, who was a deputy sheriff, upon a writ against the plaintiff, and afterwards, in the following January, sold upon the execution which was obtained in the suit. The defendant afterwards purchased her. The plaintiff had no other animal of that kind, and claimed her of the defendant as exempt from attachment previously to the sale upon the execution, and demanded her return, which was refused. Upon these facts, judgment was ordered for the plaintiff, and the defendant appealed to this court.
E. H. Lathrop, for the defendant.
A. M. Copeland, for the plaintiff.

Opinion:
Gray, J.
A heifer is a young cow, and as such exempt from attachment if the debtor has no other. Freeman v. Carpenter, 10 Verm. 433. Carruth v. Grassie, 11 Gray, 211. Pomeroy v. Trimper, ante, 403. The sale of the heifer by the defendant on execution, after notice that the plaintiff claimed her as exempt from attachment, passed no title to the purchaser; and the heifer, being now no longer held by the attachment or execution, but claimed by the defendant under a subsequent purchase from the purchaser at that sale, may be recovered by this replevin.
Judgment for the plaintiff.