Court Opinion

ID: 9647802
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 13:50:58.06113+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:53.596046
License: Public Domain

George Rose Smith, Justice. On October 3, 1963, the State Highway Commission filed an action to condemn 8.67 acres of the appellees’ land, to serve as part of the right-of-way for Interstate Highway 40. On February 7, 1964, the case was settled by the entry of a consent judgment awarding the landowners $13,300 as just compensation for their land. Nineteen months later the appellees filed the present complaint to set aside the consent judgment for fraud in its procurement. They assert that the Highway Department, by its agents and attorneys, falsely represented that it would construct a culvert under the highway of sufficient size to enable the landowners to move their cattle and machinery back and forth from one side of the highway to the other, their farm having been cut in two by the controlled-access highway. This appeal is from an order sustaining the charge of fraud and setting aside the consent judgment. Such an order is final and appealable. Norman v. Cammack, 105 Ark. 121, 150 S. W. 563 (1912). The controlling principles of law are not in dispute. The appellees had the burden of showing that the judgment was obtained by fraud. Karnes v. Gentry, 205 Ark. 1112, 172 S. W. 2d 424,(1943). The charge of fraud must be sustained by clear, strong, and satisfactory proof. Graham v. Graham, 199 Ark. 165, 133 S. W. 2d 627 (1939). In explaining why such a clear-cut case must be made by one who attacks a judgment we have often used this language: “The statute to vacate judgments by this proceeding is in derogation not only of the common law, but of the very important policy of holding judgments final after the close of the term. Citizens must have some confidence in the judgments of our judicial tribunals, as settlements of their controversies, and there should be some end to them. Unless a case be clearly within the spirit and policy of the act, the judgment should not be disturbed.” Hardin v. Hardin, 237 Ark. 237, 372 S. W. 2d 260 (1963). Fraud that entitles a party to impeach a judgment must be extrinsic of the issues tried in the case and cannot consist of fraudulent acts or testimony the truth of which was or might have been at issue in the case. It must be a fraud practiced upon the court in the procurement of the judgment itself. Ark. Stat. Ann. § 29-506 (Uepl. 1962); Alexander v. Alexander, 217 Ark. 230, 229 S. W. 2d 234 (1950). Even though the fraud that vitiates a judgment may be constructive rather than actual, constructive fraud is nonetheless a species of wrongdoing. It is a breach of a legal or equitable duty, which the law declares to be fraudulent because of its tendency to deceive others, to violate public or private confidence, or to injure public interests. Arkansas Valley Compress & Warehouse Co. v. Morgan, 217 Ark. 161, 229 S. W. 2d 133 (1950); Levinson v. Treadway, 190 Ark. 203, 78 S. W. 2d 59 (1935). The appellees’ proof, tested by the controlling rules of law, falls decidedly short of establishing actual or constructive fraud on the part of the Highway Department. The principal point in dispute concerns the size of the culvert under the highway. That underpass, as actually built, was ten feet wide and twelve feet high. The appellees insist that the dimensions of the culvert should have been just the opposite — twelve feet wide and ten feet high — and that essential farm machinery cannot be moved through the narrower corridor. C. A. Clemmons, one of the appellees, took the lead in negotiating the settlement with the Highway Department. C. A. and his son Frank testified that after the condemnation suit was filed they went to the office of the Department’s resident engineer in Clarksville to learn the size of the culvert that was to be provided for the landowners. They talked to an assistant engineer, whose name they were unable to remember and who was not produced as a witness in the case. The two Clem-monses testified that the assistant engineer showed them the Highway Department’s plans, which described the proposed culvert as being twelve feet wide and ten feet high. C. A. Clemmons first determined the actual dimensions of the concrete culvert when its construction was commenced. “It was there at the house, and I saw it.” He made no protest to the Highway Department, however, until some time after the culvert was completed. He testified that he talked to a succeeding district engineer, J. F. Price, who said that a mistake had been made in the construction of the culvert, which should have been twelve feet wide and ten feet high. Frank Clem-mons gave similar testimony. The appellees called Price as their witness, but he did not corroborate their testimony. He testified that he had checked the plans and that they specified a 10-foot width and a 12-foot height for the culvert. He positively denied having said that a mistake had been made. E. W. Smith, the resident engineer at the time of the trial, testified for the Highway Department. He produced a copy of the original plans, which showed that the culvert was designed to be ten feet wide and twelve feet high — just ás it was built. Smith described the care with which he had checked pertinent records to be sure that the plans had not been changed. There is no sound basis for questioning the authenticity or accuracy of the set of plans that were produced by Smith and received in evidence. They effectively rebut what was really the key testimony for the appellees; that is, the Clemmonses’ statement that an unidentified assistant engineer showed them a set of plans with the culvert’s dimensions reversed. We should add that the specifications for the culvert are set out in the plans in such a way that a layman could easily make a good faith mistake in determining the proposed width and the proposed height. It will be seen from our summary of the evidence that there is no sound basis for a finding that the Highway Department was guilty of actual or constructive fraud in agreeing to construct an underpass for the landowners. There is in the record certain testimony going to show that the approaches to the concrete floor of the underpass were so poorly built that they were washed out by surface water produced by heavy rains. There is, however, no proof that the Department perpetrated a fraud upon the condemnees by falsely promising to construct and maintain permanent approaches to the underpass. It is fair to say that the appellees’ evidence goes to indicate, at the very- most, that the Clemmonses understood that they had a certain agreement with the Highway Department about the promised underpass and that by mistake the Department failed to construct the underpass in conformity with that agreement. Even so, the proof fails to show that the Highway Department employees were guilty of actionable fraud, and the ap-pellees are prohibited by the Constitution from suing the State for breach of contract. Reversed and remanded for the reinstatement of the consent judgment. FoglemaN, J., dissents.