63 Ind. App. 639 | Ind. Ct. App. | 1917
This suit was brought by appellant to recover on the bond executed by appellee Judson A. .DeLay, as commissioner for the sale of real estate, and appellee Corbin, his surety. The complaint was in two paragraphs, to each of which a demurrer for insufficiency of facts to state a cause of action was sustained.
Appellant duly excepted to the ruling of the court, refused to plead further and judgment was rendered against it for costs and that it take nothing by its complaint. Prom this judgment appellant appealed and has assigned as error the ruling on the demurrer to each paragraph of its complaint.
The complaint is long and many of the details are not essential to a determination of the questions presented. It is averred that on May 5, 1913, appellant recovered judgment against one William M. DeLay for $715 in the Sullivan Circuit Court and on May 20, 1913, filed transcripts thereof in the clerk’s office in the counties of Greene and Knox; that the father of said DeLay died intestate in 1912, the owner of certain real estate in both Knox and Greene counties, leaving surviving him six children; that a suit was instituted in the Knox' Circuit Court for the partition of said
The second paragraph is the same as the first, except it contains the additional averments that while the funds were in the hands of the commissioner, appellant notified him in writing of said judgment and that it was unpaid; that when be paid the proceeds of the sale to William M. DeLay he knew that said judgement had been taken against said William M. DeLay .and that it was unpaid.
The substance of appellant’s memorandum .and of the points and propositions presented is that the averments show that appellant’s judgment was a lien on the interest of William M. DeLay in the real estate sold, at the time the sale was made by the commissioner; that the lien followed the funds and that, without further action on appellant’s part other than filing the transcript of its judgment, it
The averments do not show that appellant was a party to the partition suit or that the attention of the court was in any way brought to the fact that it held a lien on the land sold, either when the- order of sale was made or subsequent thereto, or that the order of the court directed payment of any of the funds derived from the sale to appellant, but the averments do clearly show that the transcript of the judgment was not filed until May 20, 1913, and that the real estate was ordered sold and the commissioner appointed in November, 1912.
and the orders of the court. He is an instrument or arm of the court for the discharge of certain designated duties and is primarily answerable to the court, and only becomes liable on his bond when he fails to faithfully discharge the duties of his trust. Huffman v. Darling (1899), 153 Ind. 22, 24, 53 N. E. 939.
Query — waiving the point of the lack of a legal duty on the part of the commissioner to pay appellant the amount of its judgment, whether the allegations are sufficient on the question of appellant’s damages and its right to receive payment out of the particular fund in the commissioner’s hands? King v. Easton (1893), 135 Ind. 353, 35 N. E. 181.
The trial court did not err in its rulings. Judgment affirmed.
Notes.—Reported in 114 N. E. 35. Doilies and powers of commissioners in partition proceedings, 41 Am. St. 146, 147. See under (2, 3) 30 Cyc 294; (4, 6) 23 Cyc 1351, 1352.