Amy v. Mann

287 N.W. 84, 136 Neb. 677, 1939 Neb. LEXIS 144
CourtNebraska Supreme Court
DecidedJuly 18, 1939
DocketNo. 30622
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 287 N.W. 84 (Amy v. Mann) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Nebraska Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Amy v. Mann, 287 N.W. 84, 136 Neb. 677, 1939 Neb. LEXIS 144 (Neb. 1939).

Opinion

Paine, J.

This is an equity action, brought to set aside two assignments of real estate mortgages made by the plaintiff to defendant Ruby Mann, her granddaughter, on the ground of undue influence. After hearing the evidence, the trial court dismissed the action, and entered judgment that the Tipton and Baker notes were the property of the defendant Ruby Mann. The plaintiff appeals. The motion for a new trial set out as grounds for reversal that the decision was not sustained by sufficient evidence, was contrary to law, and for errors of law occurring during the trial.

On September 6, 1933, plaintiff filed an action in equity to set aside two assignments of real estate mortgages which she had made to her granddaughter. Plaintiff alleged that the defendant Ruby Mann was her granddaughter, and made her husband, John E. Mann, also a defendant; that Ruby Mann, when a very young child, was given into her charge as her grandmother, and that she raised, clothed, and schooled her as she would her own daughter; that about five years before the petition was filed, the plaintiff, being a widow with considerable means, was induced by Ruby Mann and her husband to go to Sioux county, Nebraska, and make her home with them, where she continued to reside until the month of July, 1933; that Ruby Mann and her husband induced plaintiff to purchase, in the name of her [679]*679granddaughter, Ruby Mann, a rental property in Sioux county, the rents from which were collected by the plaintiff herself for some time; that on October 12, 1931, plaintiff loaned $600 to Mrs. Avis Tipton at 8 per cent., which was secured by a mortgage upon a property in the village of Harrison; that on January 5, 1933, plaintiff loaned B. N. Baker $1,080, which note was also signed by F. S. Baker, this loan being secured by a mortgage executed and delivered by the defendants Baker to the plaintiff as mortgagee upon 775 acres of land more or less in Sioux county; that during the summer of 1932 the plaintiff became bedfast at the home of the defendants Mann, and was attended by doctors and nurses, and it was thought that she would not recover. She charges that on March 20, 1933, an assignment of the Tipton mortgage was made, which purported to have been signed and acknowledged by her on June 30, 1932, to defendant Ruby Mann, and there was recorded an assignment to Ruby Mann of the Baker mortgage, purporting to have been signed and acknowledged by her on January 9, 1933; that she has no recollection whatever of having signed or executed said assignments; that if said instruments were actually signed by her, her signature was secured by undue influence of the defendants Mann, or one of them, wholly without consideration; that the defendants have never paid or accounted to plaintiff for any of the money or property represented by said instrument; that the mortgagors threaten to pay the amount of the mortgages to the defendant Ruby Mann as assignee, and will do so unless restrained by an order and injunction of the court, and plaintiff prays that the defendants Mann be required to account for all of the property hereinbefore described, and that a decree be entered quieting title thereto in the plaintiff as against defendants Mann, and that a lien be impressed upon the property of the Manns.

To this petition a motion to strike and a demurrer were filed, which were overruled by the court, and leave given to make certain amendments to the petition, which were made by interlineation.

[680]*680Hannah E. Amy, plaintiff, died in Council Bluffs on July 16; 1934, leaving a last will, which was probated in the district court for Pottawattamie county, and W. E. .Mumby, of Sioux county, was appointed administrator with will annexed, and this action was revived in his name.

On August 7, 1936, the defendants Ruby Mann and John E. Mann, her husband, filed answer, admitting the death of the plaintiff, the relationship of the parties, and alleging that the grandmother had returned to Sioux county and solicited and received care and the comforts of a home from her granddaughter until July, 1933, when she was spirited away by an invalid nonresident daughter during the absence of the Manns from their home; that on April 21, 1927, the plaintiff grandmother had conveyed to Ruby Mann lot 6 in block 7, village of Harrison, for love, affection, care, nurture, and making a home for the frail old lady by her affectionate grandchildren, where she remained for more than five years, and that this care was equal to the cash value of the premises conveyed by deed; that this conveyance was made upon the initiative of the grandmother, and in consideration of providing a home for her.

Defendants admit, as charged in the petition, that assign-. ments were made of the two mortgages to Ruby Mann, and that such assignments were duly recorded, and allege that such assignments were made by the plaintiff in good faith, and that she was then of sound mind. Defendants deny that said Hannah E. Amy, the grandmother, ever since the date thereof had in her possession and custody the note given by Avis Tipton, or the note given by B. N. Baker.

The defendants Mann say they are solvent and of sufficient financial ability to answer any judgment which may be recovered against them; that they now own unencumbered real estate and personal property of a sum of not less than $20,000, which is subject to execution, and ask that the title and possession of Ruby Mann to the negotiable paper, and securities assigned to her, be confirmed. The reply was a general denial.

The evidence of Hannah E. Amy was taken by deposition [681]*681in Council Bluffs on March 10, 1934. She testified that she lived with different relatives, and for some time at Harrison with her granddaughter, being her second daughter’s daughter. She testified that she wanted to lend her money out, because she had been through one bank failure, and thought farm mortgages would be better; that she loaned $600 to Mrs. Avis Tipton, for which she received a mortgage. She did not know for sure whether the exhibits her attorney offered her were the proper papers or not; did not know to whom Mrs. Tipton paid her interest money.

She testified that she loaned $1,100, “or pretty near,” to B. N. Baker, and that they gave a note and mortgage for it; that the land was located a little west and north of Harrison, adjoining Harrison. She says that she thinks the Manns had or stole the mortgage; that they did the same thing once before. She says that the Baker note was not paid, and denied that she ever gave or sold it to the Manns.

On cross-examination she told of the various members of her family, and the difficulty some of them had getting along; said that she had a will made out at Harrison, and Baker, as her attorney, wrote a will for her. On cross-examination she testified that she did not recall going to Mr. Baker’s law office to make out assignments of the mortgages. She admitted that there had never been any difficulty, or any bad feeling, between her and her granddaughter Ruby until after she got sick in Ruby’s house, “not until I found out;” that before that the grandmother trusted her in everything; that she always trusted attorney Baker, and that he told her that Ruby had an assignment of the mortgages. She said that she did not learn anything about it until March, 1933, and that she was sick then.

Her answers disclose her great age and feeble condition at the time the deposition was taken in the dwelling-house of plaintiff.. Many questions had to be asked her several times, and then failed to elicit direct or pertinent answers.

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Bluebook (online)
287 N.W. 84, 136 Neb. 677, 1939 Neb. LEXIS 144, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/amy-v-mann-neb-1939.