Swayer v. Wiemers

182 Ill. App. 651, 1913 Ill. App. LEXIS 543
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedAugust 2, 1913
DocketGen. No. 5,780
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 182 Ill. App. 651 (Swayer v. Wiemers) 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
Swayer v. Wiemers, 182 Ill. App. 651, 1913 Ill. App. LEXIS 543 (Ill. Ct. App. 1913).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Dibell

delivered the opinion of the court.

On July 11,1912, an order was entered in the County Court of Lake county in a matter pertaining to the estate of William F. Wiemers, deceased, which order was adverse to the interests of Cooke, Pope & Pope. They appealed therefrom to the Circuit Court and perfected the appeal and filed a transcript of various proceedings of the County Court, including a part of said order of July 11, 1912. After various special appearances, motions to dismiss the appeal made by parties whose interests were adverse to Cooke, Pope & Pope, and other proceedings in the Circuit Court, which we deem it unnecessary to recite, the court required Cooke, Pope & Pope to file a transcript of the entire order appealed from and when that had been done, the court dismissed their appeal for want of jurisdiction, and Cooke, Pope & Pope prosecute this appeal from, that order. Appeals from the orders of the County Court in the administration of the personal estates of deceased persons go to the Circuit Court, but appeals from orders and decrees entered in proceedings in the County Court to sell real estate to pay debts must be to the Appellate Court, unless a freehold is involved, in which latter case they go to the Supreme Court. Wachsmuth v. Penn Mut. Life Ins. Co., 231 Ill. 29; Atherton v. Hughes, 239 Ill. 632; Sifford v. Cutler, 244 Ill. 234, and cases there cited. If the order appealed from was a part of the proceedings to sell real estate to pay debts in said estate, then the appeal of Cooke, Pope & Pope should have been to this court, and the appeal to the Circuit Court was properly dismissed for want of jurisdiction. If the order appealed from related to the ordinary administration of said estate, then the Circuit Court should have taken jurisdiction and tried the matter de novo.

On December 21, 1909, William F. Wiemers died, testate, and James L. Sawyer was appointed administrator with the will annexed and qualified. Thereafter said administrator filed a petition in the County Court to sell real estate to pay debts of said deceased. All parties interested were made defendants, including persons holding liens by way of trust deeds upon various pieces of real estate of which Wiemers died seized, and also creditors who had judgment liens upon said real estate. The transcript of the County Court proceedings, filed in the Circuit Court, is exceedingly defective, but it appears therefrom that several cross petitions were filed by the widow and by other judgment creditors in the County Court in said proceeding, which cross petitions attacked the validity of the judgments of Cooke, Pope & Pope and George P. Wiemers. On December 10, 1910, a decree was entered in said cause. It found many facts proved, including a list of many pieces of real estate of which Wiemers died seized, a description of the homestead, and a statement of the widow’s rights therein, a statement of various trust deeds resting on various pieces of real estate and of the amounts due upon each, a statement of various judgments against Wiemers which were liens upon said real estate, the first of which in point of time was a judgment by confession in favor of appellants on November 23, 1909, for $2,363.46, and a statement of other later judgments in favor of other parties, including one on December 4,1909, for $814.75 in favor of George F. Wiemers. It found that it was for the best interests of the estate that the real estate should be sold free from the judgment liens and subject to the liens of the trust deeds, and that the judgment creditors had consented that the real estate be sold free of their liens and that they be paid the amounts due them out of the proceeds of the sale, and it provided that the land should be sold free and clear of the dower and homestead rights of the widow. It ordered the sale of the real estate free from the judgments and subject to the trust deeds. It directed that from the proceeds of the sale costs and attorney fees should be paid, and that from the proceeds of the sale of each piece should be paid the value of the dower interest of the widow in such piece, and from the sale of the homestead should be paid $1,000 to the widow, and then the judgments should be paid; but if the sum remaining after paying costs and the value of the dower and homestead estates was not sufficient to pay all said judgments in full, then the administrator should pay the various judgment creditors “in the order of their priority to be hereinafter determined by-the court.” On July 11,1912, the order appealed from was entered. It is entitled in the petition to sell real estate to pay debts and also in three cross petitions, one of which was by most of the judgment creditors other than Cooke, Pope & Pope and George F. Weimers. It recited the prior proceedings and the decree of December 10, 1910, for the sale of the real estate and for the distribution of the proceeds, and the provision that if the proceeds were not sufficient to pay all the judgments, they then should be paid in the order of their priority, to be thereafter determined by the court; and that the real estate had all been sold and that the net proceeds were insufficient to pay said judgments, and that the judgment in favor of Cooke, Pope & Pope, if permitted to stand, would absorb all the money derived from the sale of real estate, and that there was no other money belonging to the estate, and that there had been no adjudication as to the validity or priority of any of said judgments with reference to each other. The order then found the date of each judgment and the amount due thereon, except the judgments in favor of George P. Wiemers and of Cooke, Pope & Pope, and it found in detail many facts against their validity and that said judgments and the notes upon which they were based were obtained with intent to defraud the creditors and especially the other judgment creditors and the widow. It decreed that the judgment in favor of Cooke, Pope & Pope and the judgment in favor of George P. Wiemers be set aside and declared fraudulent and void as to the other judgment creditors and the widow and that the other judgments and the widow be paid out of the proceeds of the sale of real estate in the order therein prescribed, and that, if any funds remained after such other judgments and the widow were paid, the residue should be paid pro rata upon the judgments of Cooke, Pope & Pope and George F. Wiemers.

In our opinion the foregoing statement of the decree for the sale of the real estate and of the substance of the order of July 11,1912, demonstrates that the latter order related solely to the proceeding to sell real estate to pay debts. The court was there determining the rights of the several parties growing out of their supposed liens upon said real estate and was there deciding how the proceeds arising from the sale of the real estate should be divided among said lienors. The order had nothing to do with the personal estate, except to find that there was none left. Appellants contend that the County Court had no power to set aside a judgment of the Circuit Court as fraudulent but that a suit in chancery must be resorted to for that purpose. Clayton v. Clayton, 250 Ill. 433, holds that, under section 101 of the Administration Act as amended in 1887 (J. & A. 1¡150), such a controversy as this is within the jurisdiction of the County Court in proceedings to sell real estate to pay debts. But if the County Court committed an error in attempting to adjudicate upon that question in distributing the proceeds of the sale of this real estate, yet the appeal to correct that error should have been to the Appellate Court.

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Related

In re Estate of Schwartz
275 Ill. App. 374 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1934)
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270 Ill. App. 464 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1933)
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250 Ill. App. 82 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1928)

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182 Ill. App. 651, 1913 Ill. App. LEXIS 543, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/swayer-v-wiemers-illappct-1913.