Case Name: Benjamin F. Herdman, v. Robert Cann
Court: Delaware Superior Court
Jurisdiction: Delaware
Decision Date: 1858
Citations: 2 Houst. 41
Docket Number: 
Parties: Benjamin F. Herdman, v. Robert Cann.
Judges: 
Reporter: Delaware Reports
Volume: 7
Pages: 41–41

Head Matter:
Benjamin F. Herdman, v. Robert Cann.
No proceeding can be had on a judgment before a Justice of the Peace, after a duly certified transcript of the judgment, execution and return of nulla bona thereon has been filed in the Superior Court, which makes it in effect, a judgment of that court.
Certiorari . Cann had recovered a judgment against Herdman before a Justice of the Peace, on which an execution had been issued and returned nulla bona, and thereupon a duly certified transcript of the docket entries of the judgment, execution, and return was filed in the office of the Prothonatory, and entered on the records of the court. Afterward, and after the judgment had been standing more than three years, the plaintiff in it sued out a writ of scire facias upon it before the Justice of the Peace, with a view to obtain execution against goods subsequently acquired by the defendant.
The exception was to the sci. fa. and that it would not lie after the entry of the transcript in this court, on the judgment before the Justice of the Peace.

Opinion:
The Court
sustained the exception. The entry of the transcript here gave to the judgment below the effect of a judgment of this court, and not merely a lien on the land and execution process upon it against the real estate of the defendant in case he had no personal property; and such being its effect, it was not the design of the statute to give the plaintiff two judgments subsisting together, one here and the other below, one of limited scope and operation before a court of special jurisdiction, and the other before a court of superior and general jurisdiction, for the same debt; ÍTo proceeding therefore could be had on the judgment before the Justice, after its entry here.