Case Name: S. N. ANDERSON v. W. T. COLEMAN
Court: Supreme Court of California
Jurisdiction: California
Decision Date: 1880
Citations: 56 Cal. 124
Docket Number: No. 6,803
Parties: S. N. ANDERSON v. W. T. COLEMAN.
Judges: 
Reporter: California Reports
Volume: 56
Pages: 124–127

Head Matter:
[No. 6,803.
Department One.]
S. N. ANDERSON v. W. T. COLEMAN.
Injunction — Maucious Prosecution—Statute of Limitations. — A temporary injunction was granted, and dissolved, and afterwards judgment went for defendant. In an action by tlie defendant against the plaintiff, in the injunction suit, for suing out tlie writ maliciously, and without probable cause, commenced more than two years after the dissolution of the injunction, but within two years after the judgment; held, that the cause of action ivas barred.
Id.—Td.— Id.—Sharpstein, J., concurring in the judgment, on tlie ground that there was no evidence of malice, was of the opinion that the statute commenced running only upon the final termination of the injunction suit; as until then want of probable cause could not be established.
Appeal from a judgment for the plaintiff, and from an order denying new trial, in the Superior Court of Marin County. Temple, J.
Thomas H. Hansen, and L. E. Pratt, for Appellants.
The injunction suit was pending until the ,20th day of January, 1877. (Code Civ. Proc. § 1049.) There was no final determination that plaintiff was not entitled to the injunction until that appeal was disposed of.
To have commenced a suit in the same court for damages, while the very issue, whether the injunction was wrongfully sued out or not, was still pending, would have been a vain and useless, and a premature, proceeding. To have commenced such suit in any other court would have been an unwarrantable interference with, and an invasion of, the jurisdiction of the court in which the injunction suit was pending. It would have been a complete answer to an action so commenced, to say that the very question sought to be tried was already in course of trial between the same parties, in the same court, or in another court of co-ordinate jurisdiction.
In other words, no right of action for damages suffered under the injunction accrued to us, until the right of plaintiff to have such injunction was finally adjudicated'against him; and the Statute of Limitations, by its express terms, begins to run, not from the time the injury was done to us, but from the time when our right of action therefor accrued to us. (Code Civ. Proc. § 812; High on Injunctions, § 981; 2 Greenl. Ev. §§ 449, 452; Gorton v. DeAngelis, 6 Wend. 420; Bump v. Betts, 19 id. 421; Potter v. Casterline, 8 Pep. 312; Winn v. Peckham, 42 Wis. 493; Hamilburgh v. Shepard, 119 Mass. 30; Brown v. Randall, 36 Conn. 56; Leever v. Hamill, 57 Ind. 423; Spring v. Besore, 12 B. Mon. 551.)
E. B. Mahon, and B. S. Brooks, for Respondent.
This is an action on a liability not founded upon an instrument in writing, and is barred in two years. (Code Civ. Proc. § 339, subd. 1; Chipman v. Morrill, 20 Cal. 131; Code Civ. Proc. § 939; Kittredge v. Stevens, 23 Cal. 283; Sharp v. Miller, 54 id. 329.)

Opinion:
Myrick, J.:
Coleman, the defendant herein, commenced an action against Anderson and Dubois, plaintiffs herein, to obtain a perpetual injunction. The Court allowed a temporary injunction, a bond having been given, and the -same was served on defendants December 29th, 1874. On the 9th of March, 1875, on motion of the defendants in that action, after notice, the Court made an order dissolving the injunction. Ho appeal was taken from that order. Subsequently, judgment went for defendants in that action, on demurrer, which judgment was affirmed on appeal.
This action, commenced March 20th, 1877, was not on the bond, but against Coleman for suing out the writ maliciously, and without probable cause. On the trial, the Court gave judgment of non-suit, and plaintiffs appealed from the judgment and the order denying their motion for a new trial.
Two points are involved in the appeal:
1. Was plaintiffs' action barred by the Statute of Limitations ?
2. Did plaintiffs offer any evidence of malice ?
First—The writ of injunction was dissolved March 9th, 1875. Plaintiffs' cause of action, if they had any, was then complete, even if not perfect when the writ was sued out; it was not delayed, or the time postponed, by the fact that Coleman had sixty days in which to appeal from the order dissolving the writ. Plaintiffs at least had two years, from and after March 9th, 1875, in which to commence their action. They did not commence it until March 20th, 1877. Their right of action did not at all depend upon the subsequent proceedings in that suit. It was the writ that they complained of, and the force of that writ was spent upon its dissolution. If plaintiffs ever had a cause of action, it was barred by the Statute of Limitations. (§ 339, Code Civ. Proc.) In our opinion, this disposes of the case.
Judgment and order affirmed.
Thobnton, J., concurred.