Texas Employers' Ins. Ass'n v. Soto

294 S.W. 639, 1927 Tex. App. LEXIS 277
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedMay 5, 1927
DocketNo. 2036.
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 294 S.W. 639 (Texas Employers' Ins. Ass'n v. Soto) 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
Texas Employers' Ins. Ass'n v. Soto, 294 S.W. 639, 1927 Tex. App. LEXIS 277 (Tex. Ct. App. 1927).

Opinion

WALTHALL, J.

Texas Employers’ Insurance Association brought this suit in the district court of El Paso county against Petra Soto and Toribio Rascón to set aside an award of the Industrial Accident Board of Texas, theretofore made by said board against the association, in favor of Petra Soto and Toribio Rascón, on the theory that they were, respectively, the surviving common-law wife and posthumous child of Tori-bio Rascón, Sr., alias Enrique Puentes, deceased, who received injuries resulting in his death while in course of his employment as a servant of El Paso Ice & Refrigerator Company, in El Paso county, Tex., said employer carrying a workmen’s compensation insurance policy with said association for the benefit of its employees.

Petra Soto and Toribio Rascón, by his guardian ad litem, filed their cross-action, and the court, pursuant to a special verdict of the jury, rendered judgment denying plaintiff’s prayer to set aside the award of the boai’d, and plaintiff has appealed to this court.

Opinion.

As suggested by appellant in its brief, there is only one issue of fact in the ease. If Petra Soto was the common-law wife of To-ribio Rascón, Sr., at the time of his death, the judgment entered by the trial judge is correct; otherwise not.

The trial court submitted the only one issue of fact to the jury, as follows:

“Do you find from the evidence that on or about January or February, 1923, Petra Soto and Toribio Rascón mutually consented and agreed together with each other to become husband and wife, with the intention, for the rest of their lives, of living and cohabiting together as.such, and that in pursuance of such agreement, if such agreement there was, they did professedly live and cohabit together as husband and wife?”

To which issue the jury answered, “Yes.”

It is insisted by appellant that the evidence , offered was not such as to justify the submission of the issue to the jury, and that the court should have given the requested peremptory charge directing the verdict in favor of the appellant association.

Petra Soto was the only witness who testified in the ease. We quote from her testimony, on direct examination, as follows:

“My name is Petra Soto. I live on Virginia street, El Paso, Tex. I have lived here about 18 years. I knew Toribio Rascón in his lifetime. * * * He died on the 29th, but I don’t remember what month it was, 1924. * * * I had lived with him about 7 months before he died. * * * I was living, at the time, began living with him, on Kansas and Seventh, 811. I lived at that place prior to the time I began living with him. * * * I had known him for some time before I began living with him. * * * During that time, before I began living with him, I saw him frequently. As to how I came to go and live with him, we had sort of meeting affair there at the house where I was living in a tenement house, and he spoke to me about living together, and I told him I would *640 because be said We would live as husband and wife. I agreed to that. When he said that to me, why, he moved over to that place I was living before. He was working at the ice company at that time, and he continued to work at the ice company from that time on up to the time of his death. He lived the remainder of the time after he began living with me there up to his death at Kansas and Seventh, in the same house with me. He lived at the same house when he was killed, he was taken to the same 'house. As 1 said before, he promised to support me and my family and live with me; that is the agreement'we went to. He did that from then on up to the time of his death; he complied with his agreement. He supported me from that on up to the time of his death. This boy I have with me is named Toribio Rascón. I think he was born on the 12th of November, X am not very sure, I think of the same year that Toribio Rascón was killed. Toribio is the father of the child. I think the child was born about two months and some days after Toribio Rascón was killed.”

On cross-examination, Petra Soto said:

“I have two children. I have had three children (giving their ages). * * * Notal Aguillar was the father of the oldest child. X don’t know where he is. I was never married to him, we lived together. Just lived together, just like Toribio Rascón and I lived together. * * * When I started living with him (Aguil-lar), I did not have an agreement with him that we would live together henceforth as husband and wife — that was just casual. * * * I first met Toribio Rascón during January, 1925, at a neighborhood meeting or party at. my house. * * * Some days after that he began taking hia meals at my house. He was already living there with me, but I did not want to tell his father about it. I began mending and washing his clothes. * ♦ * He gave me his pay as he got it from the company. I probably made that statement to the Industrial Accident Board as a basis of my claim. * * * At that time I don’t know what I did say. It is a fact he did pay me $30 a month for his meals and mending his clothes; he gave me his weekly pay. He had been sleeping at my.house before February, 1925. He paid $8 rent, yes, sir; but he did not keep on paying me $30 a month as he did before. He afterwards gave me all of his pay. He kept paying me $30 a month. When he spoke to me about this, he told ine we was to live as husband and wife. He told me we were going to live that way. I do not remember that I had that idea on tíie 2d day of September, 1925, when I put in my claim to the Industrial Accident Board. I have never been married to any man. I have had three children.”

On redirect examination, witness, in speaking of Toribio Rascón, said:

“We went out in public together. We would go to picture shows, and would go to Juarez.” Once they went together to visit her uncle and aunt. “He came to my house to live about the first of the year, 1925, and we immediately began living together as husband and wife when he moved over.”

Without quoting the evidence further, it shows that the place occupied by Petra Soto ■ and Toribio Rascón consisted of two rooms and in which lived Petra Soto, Toribio Ras-cón, Petra’s mother, and Petra’s two boys. Their ages are uncertain, and we will not undertake to state them.

Appellant read in evidence the certified copy of the certificate or claim which appel-lee presented to the Industrial Accident Board as the basis for her claim in this case for compensation.

We have concluded that the evidence, extracts from which are copied above, is sufficient, in our opinion, to support the finding of the jury on the issue submitted and the judgment of the trial court based thereon.-

To constitute the marital relation of husband and wife at common law, as contended for by appellee, there must be a mutual consent or agreement, expressed or implied, between the man and the woman to become then and thenceforth husband and wife, and, pursuant to such consent or agreement, followed up by a living together in such agreed relationship. Such consent or agreement without a living together as husband and wife, or a cohabitation or living together without such agreement would not, in this state, constitute a common-law marriage. Grigsby v. Reib, 105 Tex. 597, 153 S. W. 1124, L. R. A. 1915E, 1, Ann. Cas. 1915C, 1011; Schwingle v. Keifer, 105 Tex. 609, 153 S. W. 1132.

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294 S.W. 639, 1927 Tex. App. LEXIS 277, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/texas-employers-ins-assn-v-soto-texapp-1927.