Johnson v. McMahan

40 S.W.2d 920, 1931 Tex. App. LEXIS 1240
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJune 10, 1931
DocketNo. 3621.
StatusPublished
Cited by23 cases

This text of 40 S.W.2d 920 (Johnson v. McMahan) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Johnson v. McMahan, 40 S.W.2d 920, 1931 Tex. App. LEXIS 1240 (Tex. Ct. App. 1931).

Opinion

HAUL, O. J.

The appellant Johnson, joined by W. P. T. Smith, sued Mrs. McMahan, as principal, and W. W. Sample, J. E. Morris, R. J. Hairgrove, and George S. Dink, as sureties on an injunction bond, to recover damages alleged to have resulted from the wrongful granting of a temporary injunction by the district court at the instance and request of the defendants.

The injunction was granted in cause No. 1002 on the docket of the district court of Dickens county; that being an action by Mrs. McMahan against the plaintiffs, who are appellants in this case, to restrain them from digging a ditch and for the additional item of $110 court costs which accrued in the first cause, No. 1002. The $110 item was expended by appellants herein for a statement of facts prepared in cause No. 1002 by the court reporter and delivered to them too late to be taxed in the cost bill of the transcript in said cause on appeal. In cause 1002 Mrs. McMahan executed a bond for temporary injunction in the sum of $500. Appellants herein seek to recover the $500 and $110 costs from her sureties on the bond and the further sum of $1,074 against Mrs. McMahan. Mrs. McMahan’s injunction bond is for the sum of $500, “conditioned that the said Mrs. O. O. McMahan would abide the decision which may be made therein,” and further binds her “to pay all sums of money and costs that may be adjudged against her if the injunction be dissolved in whole or in part.”

The district court granted the temporary writ of injunction on the 23d day of November, 1927. Smith has disclaimed in this action, and no further mention will be made of him in connection with the case. The writ of injunction commanded Johnson to desist from digging and excavating a ditch which he had commenced for the purpose of draining a lake or depression existing upon his land until the further orders of the court. The writ was made returnable at the November term, 1927, of the district court, which convened on the 28th day of November, 1927.

The substance of the appellant’s allegations, in addition to what has been stated, is: That *921 he was the owner of a quarter section of land which had a shallow depression or basin upon it and in wet seasons this basin would fill with water, which was locally known as Dry Lake. That it was fertile and highly productive land, and Johnson was preparing to put same in cultivation, and, in order to drain the lake, which covered about 120 acres of his quarter section, he commenced to cut a ditch connecting the lake with Hackberry draw, and had obtained a strip of land from Smith through which the ditch would, be dug. By reason of the issuance of the temporary injunction, he was prevented from draining his land. That the suit was filed to the November term, hut too late for trial at said term, and that the case was not tried until the 9th day of June, 1928, at which time the court perpetuated the temporary injunction. Appellant charges: That it was only during the fall and winter months that he could cut the drainage ditch. That' it was a task of considerable magnitude, requiring the assembling of teams, implements, feed for his teams and laborers to do the work, which could not be done during the spring and summer months and during farming seasons. That he broke the land and put it in cultivation in the winter and in the spring of 1928. That his crops were planted at the date of the trial of said cause 1002. That even if the judgment of the court had been in his favor on the 9th day of June, it was then too late for him to have drained his land. That about the middle of July, 1928, as the result of heavy rains, the lake was filled with water, which destroyed his growing crops. That he had a cropper working said land and that plaintiff’s share was one-half. That certain crops of cotton and feed would have been ■made and gathered from the land but for the water that destroyed his said crops and caused his loss. That hut for the injunction he Would have drained the water from his land in time to have enabled his cropper to cultivate and raise the crops in 1928, and that plaintiff’s share of said crop would have amounted to $1,039. That, if Mrs. McMahan had sued praying only for a permanent injunction, he would have completed his ditch before planting time in 1928 and before the final judgment was rendered in June, and would have filed supersedeas bond and appealed from the adverse judgment, thus leaving his drainage system in good condition and protecting his crops until the case was decided in the appellate courts. That he appealed from the judgment rendered against him in June, which perpetuated the injunction, and that this Court of Appeals reversed the judgment of the trial court perpetuating the' injunction, and affirmed it as to the damages, holding that the injunction had been wrongfully issued; the decision of this court being based upon answers to certified questions from the Supreme Court. 15 S.W.(2d) 1023.

Plaintiff sued for additional damages in the sum of $35 for necessary and reasonable expenses incurred in removing a fence along the proposed line of the drainage ditch and rebuilding the same. He further alleges that in causé 1002 he paid for a statement of facts which he was not able to use and which was not taxed in the cost bill on appeal because it was delivered by the court stenographer too late.

The appellees answered by a plea to the jurisdiction of the court, alleging: That it appeared from the petition that this- suit was to recover on a bond in the sum of only $500. That, said bond being given in a temporary injunction proceeding, damages, if any, recoverable against either the principal or the sureties, were limited to the amount named in the bond; there being no allegation that the injunction was sued out maliciously and/ or without probable cause. That the allegations wliereby plaintiff was seeking to recover additional damages were made with the fraudulent intent of conferring jurisdiction on the district court. That the damages, if any, sought to be recovered, accrued after the temporary injunction ceased to function and after the injunction had been made permanent on a trial of the case on its merits; such damages not being recoverable on a temporary injunction bond, notwithstanding the reversal of the judgment on appeal.

Subject to their plea to the jurisdiction, the appellees also answered by general demurrer and several special exceptions. The general demurrer and special exceptions were overruled, with the exception of two exceptions, numbered 8 and 9, to the effect that plaintiff’s allegation that the injunction suit was brought too late for trial at the November term and that it was impossible to try the ease on its merits until the June term, 1928, were conclusions of the pleader and because appellant could have answered, moved to dissolve, and exercised the rights given by law in such cases, to have had the temporary injunction dissolved, and to the further effect that the item of $110 costs of the statement of facts in the injunction suit should have been included in the costs of'that suit, and that such item has been adjudged in the former case and plaintiff has no right to recover herein.

Defendants further interposed pleas of res judicata and estoppel, alleging: That at the June term, 1928, in said cause No. 1002, the appellant Johnson, who was defendant therein, filed a cross-action in which he sought to recover damages for the alleged wrongful issuance of the temporary writ of injunction in said cause, thereby putting his right to recover damages in issue.

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Bluebook (online)
40 S.W.2d 920, 1931 Tex. App. LEXIS 1240, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/johnson-v-mcmahan-texapp-1931.