Marks v. Mitchell

111 S.E. 763, 90 W. Va. 702, 1922 W. Va. LEXIS 279
CourtWest Virginia Supreme Court
DecidedApril 11, 1922
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 111 S.E. 763 (Marks v. Mitchell) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering West Virginia Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Marks v. Mitchell, 111 S.E. 763, 90 W. Va. 702, 1922 W. Va. LEXIS 279 (W. Va. 1922).

Opinion

Meredith, Judge:

By decree of the circuit court of Summers County, Oeto-ber 9, 1918, Myrtle Mitchell was granted an absolute divorce from J. D. Mitchell, the principal defendant in this cause. She has since remarried and institutes this suit under her present name of Myrtle Marks. She and her first husband had two infant children, but in the original decree of divorce nothing was said as to their custody or maintenance, or as to alimony for the plaintiff. Upon the entry of that decree, the cause appears to have been dropped from the docket. At a subsequent term, on March 11, 1919, the cause was reinstated upon the docket upon order of publication, the defendant being then a non-resident; he made no personal appearance in the subsequent proceedings; on that day the court entered another decree awarding the custody of the two children to the plaintiff and $50.00 per month as permanent alimony for the support of the plaintiff and the two children, and authorized execution to be issued therefor. On August 11,1921, execution was issued for the amount then accrued under the decree, $1450, which execution was returned by the sheriff “No property found.”

On August 13, 1921, the plaintiff instituted this suit in chancery against her former husband, J. D. Mitchell, by filing her affidavit for attachment for the sum of $1450, stating therein that the claim was for support and necessaries [704]*704furnished by her for defendant’s infant children between March 11, 1919, and August 11, 1921, and that defendant impliedly promised to pay the same and that he was a nonresident. That same day the attachment was levied on his interest in a house and lot in Hinton, which he owned jointly with a brother and three sisters, subject to his mother’s right of dower, and a notice of the pending suit was filed in the county clerk’s office. No summons was issued in the cause until September 3, 1921, when process was issued for J. D. Mitchell, his mother, Iantha Mitchell, Fred Mitchell, Grace Mitchell, Maragaret Gwinn, Clara Grover, the First National Bank of Hinton and C. B. Bryant. The Bank, Iantha Mitchell, Grace Mitchell and Margaret Gwinn were personally served with process. At September rules an order of publication was awarded as to J. D. Mitchell, Fred Mitchell, and Clara Grover, and returned executed at October rules. Also on September 5, a second order of attachment was issued on which Iantha Mitchell and First National Bank of Hinton were summoned as garnishees. At the succeeding October term the Bank and one, W. H. Roberts, as garnishees, filed their answers, denying any liability to their co-defendant, J. D. Mitchell; from the record before us there is nothing to show that Roberts was summoned as a garnishee or made a party to the proceedings, but by order entered on November 4, the Bank and Roberts were each discharged from the suit.

On November 2, 1921, the cause came on to be heard upon the bill and exhibits, process duly executed on those personally served, order of publication as to the nonresident defendants and upon the attachment issued August 13th, the levy made thereon, together with the affidavit for the attachment, notice of Ms pendens filed on August 13th and upon the demurrer of the defendant, Iantha Mitchell, to the bill, and upon the answer of Iantha Mitchell then filed, and general replication thereto, and upon the motion of Iantha Mitchell, Grace Mitchell, Margaret Gwinn and the First National Bank of Hinton to quash the attachment issued on August 13th, and upon the return and levy of the same; the court thereupon adjudged that the plaintiff’s decree for per[705]*705manent alimony entered in the divorce proceedings on March 11, 1919, was void because of defendant’s want of personal service of notice of the reinstatement of the canse on the docket. The court also sustained the demurrer to the bill interposed by Iantha Mitchell and quashed the attachment issued on August 13th, on the ground that no process or summons was issued in this cause until September 3, 1921, and adjudged that the notice of Us pendens issued and recorded August 13th was not issued or recorded in a pending suit, the court in effect adjudging that the issuance of a foreign attachment without the issuance also of a summons or order of publication is not the commencement or institution of a suit and decreed that this suit was not pending as to the defendant, J. D. Mitchell, or any of the other defendants until September 3, 1921, that being the date of the issuance of the summons.

Thereupon the court certified to and asked the judgment of this court upon the sufficiency of the affidavit for the original attachment, the attachment order and return thereon, the second attachment and return thereon, the summons issued in the cause, the bill of complaint, the demurrer and answers to said bill, the order of publication issued at September rules, the decree of March 11, 1919, for permanent alimony, and the execution issued August 11, 1921, with the return thereon.

In this proceeding the court can not pass upon the order quashing the attachment. The court below as well as counsel for the parties seem to have overlooked the fact that under the first paragraph of section 1 of chapter 135, Code, an order quashing an attachment is an appealable order; such an order can not be reviewed in this court upon certificate as provided in the second paragraph of that section. In the case of Heater v. Lloyd, 85 W. Va. 570, 102 S. E. 228, Judge Lynch says: ‘ ‘ The effect of the provisions of that statute is to circumscribe, restrict and limit the right of this court to entertain and decide only questions immediately arising in the preliminary stages of a controversy, that is, mere interlocutory orders, not those fully and completely terminating the action or suit by final judgment or decree. [706]*706To obtain relief from an erroneous judgment or decree the party aggrieved must resort to tbe usual writs provided by law for that purpose, and not to those provided for a special purpose.” To the same effect is the ease of Pittsburg and West Virginia Gas Co. v. Shreve, 90 W. Va. 277, 110 S. E. 714.

It will be observed that under the second paragraph of that statute this court in reviewing matters presented upon certificate of the trial court is limited in its jurisdiction to “any question arising upon the sufficiency of a summons or return of service, or challenge of the sufficiency of a pleading.” But where the trial court has passed upon the sufficiency of the summons or return of service or the sufficiency of a pleading and in doing so has entered an order which may be reviewed by appeal or writ of error as provided for in- the first paragraph this court can review such order only by some one of the usual writs by way of appellate procedure. For example, in the case of Heater v. Lloyd, it was held that this court might properly consider the correctness of the ruling of the trial court in sustaining a demurrer to a bill, but where the court has taken the further step and has dismissed the bill as to one or more of the parties defendant, such action because of its finality as to those .dismissed from the suit, if erroneous, can not be corrected by this court as to those dismissed therefrom except upon appeal. To the «ame effect is the holding in the case of Gas Company v. .Shreve. Inattention to this distinction by trial courts and ■counsel may defeat the very purpose of the second paragraph ■of the statute and lead to costly, if not fatal, delays.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
111 S.E. 763, 90 W. Va. 702, 1922 W. Va. LEXIS 279, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/marks-v-mitchell-wva-1922.