Shunick v. Thompson

25 Ill. App. 619, 1887 Ill. App. LEXIS 175
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedJanuary 7, 1888
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 25 Ill. App. 619 (Shunick v. Thompson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Shunick v. Thompson, 25 Ill. App. 619, 1887 Ill. App. LEXIS 175 (Ill. Ct. App. 1888).

Opinion

Bakes, J.

This was debt on a bond, dated March 13,1885, and executed by Pat Morris, John Morris, and David Shunick, for the purpose of appealing from the judgment of a Justice of the Peace to the County Court of Warren County, in an action of forcible entry and detainer brought by Thompson against Pat and John Morris.

The conditions of the obligation were those required by section 19 of the forcible entry and detainer act. The declaration filed herein contained four assignments of breach. First. That plaintiff sustained great loss and damage by reason of the withholding of the premises, to wit, the value of the use and occupation of the premises in controversy in said suit by the said Pat Morris and John Morris during the pendency of said appeal, to wit, the sum of §600, which the defendants have wholly failed to pay. Second. That the rent of said premises so withheld from said plaintiff by said Pat Morris and John Morris before the final determination of said suit was worth the sum of §600, from the 1st of March, 1885, to the 1st of March, 1886, during which time said plaintiff was deprived of possession of said premises, which sum the defendants have not paid. The third breach was for costs awarded in the forcible entry and detainer suit, and the fourth breach was for attorney fees and expenses in said suit. A demurrer to the fourth breach was sustained. Demurrers were also sustained to the 2d, 3d, 5th, 6th and 7th pleas. The first plea was non est factum^ and there was issue and trial upon that and upon the fourth plea. Verdict and judgment were for Thompson for $600 debt and $544.46 damages.

The first error assigned is that the court erred in overruling the demurrer to the first and second breaches.

Appellants can take nothing by this assignment, for by pleading to the breaches they waived the grounds of their demurrer. Vanderbilt v. Johnson, 3 Scam. 48; Home M. F. Ins. Co. v. Garfield, 60 Ill. 124; McFadden v. Fortier, 20 Ill. 509.

It is also sought to question the sufficiency of the declaration by insisting that even if the 5th, 6th and 7th ¡deas are bad, they are good enough for a bad decoration, and that the demurrers to them should have been carried back and- sustained to the first and second breaches. A demurrer to special pleas can not be carried back to the declaration over the plea of non est factum. It was expressly so ruled in Mix v. People, 86 Ill. 312. See, also. Culver v. Third Nat. Bank, 64 Ill. 528, and cases there cited.

Besides this, it is the evident intention of the statute, when appeals are taken in actions of forcible entry and detainer, to secure not only rents due or to become due, but also compensation for all injuries occasioned to plaintiffs in such actions, whether the relation of landlord and tenant exists between the parties to the suit or not. The second condition of the statutory bond, therefore, provides for the" payment of rents due or to become due, and the third condition is intended to cover, more especially, cases where the relation of landlord and tenant does not exist.

The condition of the bond here in question is, to pay all damages and loss which the plaintiff may sustain by reason of the withholding of the premises in controversy. The first breach is a good assignment of breach thereon. That breach is not to recover rent or compensation for use and occupation of the promises, but loss and damage sustained by reason of the withholding of the premises; and such loss and damage is alleged to be the value of the use and occupation of the premises during the pendency of the appeal. In Gilliam v. Coon, 10 Ill. App. 43, a case where the parties were not landlord and tenant, this court held that where one wilfully withholds the possession of lands from the owner who is entitled thereto, he incurs a liability for at least their reasonable rental value for the time it is so withheld.

In Higgins v. Parker, 48 Ill. 445, the condition of the bond was to pay “the value of the use and occupation of the premises,” and it was held the suit was not for use and occupation, and that it was only necessary to aver, in assigning breaches of the bond, that the plaintiff had been deprived of the possession during the pendency of the appeal. The case is an authority to show, if any be needed, that “ use and occupation” and “the value of the use and occupation” are not synonymous terms, as seems to be contended by appellants. Appellee was -wrongfully kept out of the possession of the premises during the pendency of the appeal, and no good reason is perceived why the value of the use and occupation of the reasonable rental value during such pendency is not the correct, measure of damages.

'The covenant'd the condition is, to pay all damages and loss sustained by reason of the withholding; and that which he was deprived of was the use an 1 occupation pf the land, and clearly that which would compensate him and make him whole is the value of that of which he is deprived.

It is claimed the court below erred in sustaining demurrers to the 2d, 3d, 5th, 6th and 7th pleas. The 2d plea was nil debet, and it is elementary that in debt on a bond the plea of nil debet is bad on demurrer. The 3d plea, that the defendants do not owe the plaintiff any rent, was but an informal plea of nil debet. The substance of the 5th plea was actio non, because Thompson claimed possession under a lease of a term of one year from March 1, 1885, from Thomas Buzan; that Halloway held an overdue mortgage given by Buzan, and for condition broken, recovered judgment in ejectment on the 8tli day of May, 1885, against John and Pat Morris for the promises, and thereupon took possession thereof, and leased them to Pat Morris until March 1, 1886.

The substance of the 6th plea was actio non, because, after the delivery of the bond, to wit, on April 11,1885, Ilalloway, having a title prior to and better than that of Thompson, leased the premises to Pat Morris, by virtue of which lease Morris afterward entered the premises and ejected Thompson, and has held possession ever since.

The 7th plea was to the 1st and 2d breaches, except as to the sum of §1. The substance of it was that the light of possession upon which recovery was had in the forcible entry and detainer suit was under a lease from Buzan from March 1,1885, to March, 1886; that Hallo way held a mortgage on the land from Buzan to secure §5,200, which, at the time of such leasing, was long past due; that, after the making of the bond' in suit, to wit, on May 8, 1885, Hallo way recovered judgment in ejectment under said mortgage for condition broken against John and Pat Morris, who were occupants of the premises, under which judgment Ilalloway ousted John and Pat Morris and took possession himself; and that thereupon Halloway leased the premises to Morris, who held possession under such lease from that time during all the time complained of, and paid rent to Ilalloway, of all which Thompson had full notice.

We understand appellee to claim that the status of Thompson and of John and Pat Morris in relation to the quarter section of land in question was determined, so far as this case is concerned, by the judgment of February 19, 1886, in the forcible entry and detainer suit, and that such judgment is conclusive upon the defendants in this suit on the bond.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
25 Ill. App. 619, 1887 Ill. App. LEXIS 175, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/shunick-v-thompson-illappct-1888.