Court Opinion

ID: 9830818
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 20:31:27.836472+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:27.195787
License: Public Domain

On Appellees’ Motion for Rehearing.
In disposing of the assignments discussed in the original opinion, we relied upon the facts stated in appellant’s bill of exception No. 2 for the grounds of the objection made to the evidence which was excluded. Counsel for appellees in his motion for a rehearing refers to the original statement of facts for the purpose of showing that the further objection that no predicate had been made for the introduction of the recitals was also made at the time the deeds referred to were offered. By reference to that part of the record, it appears that the objections mentioned were interposed to the entire deed. The court at first determined that the appellant, defendant below, should offer more testimony for the purpose of accounting for the absence of the originals. After other testimony was adduced, it seems that the court overruled the objections and admitted the deeds without any qualification. The bill of exception shows that after this was done, and after all the evidence both for the plaintiffs and defendant had been concluded, the court sustained the objection of the plaintiffs to the recitals in the three deeds referred to in the original opinion, and excluded them from evidence. The court appends the following qualification in approving the bill of exception: “The foregoing bill of exception is approved with the following explanation and qualifications: The three deeds of conveyance above referred to are offered by the defendant in evidence in support of its title to the land in controversy. No objection was made to the deeds as a whole, but the plaintiffs objected to the self-serving declaration in the deeds as evidence of title or for any purpose at that time and stage of the trial. The objection was at the time passed over for a ruling to be made later. There being no occupancy of the land by any of the grantees under the conveyances and nothing to show ownership under said recitals, the court held the deed admissible but the recitals therein complained of inadmissible because self-serving, and, as no right was exercised thereunder, were, in the state of the record when the evidence was closed, inadmissible for any purpose.” It appears from the foregoing that the court based his ruling *1015solely upon tlie ground that the recitals were seli-serving, and the inference is that other grounds were not considered.
We adhere to our original conclusion, believing that justice can be done in this case only by remanding it for another trial. The motion for a rehearing is therefore overruled.