106 Ga. 791 | Ga. | 1899
It appears from the record that T. A. Parsons Sr. died. A woman named Jane Ennis, now Braswell, opened his trunk and took therefrom money to the amount of $1,200, claiming it as her own. She afterwards deposited it with Hicks, the present defendant in error. Shortly thereafter Hicks was made administrator of Parsons. Mrs. Braswell demanded of him the money deposited, and he refused to surrender it; whereupon she brought her action of trover against Hicks individually, to recover the money. Hicks pleaded, in substance, that, after he had received the money from her, he had ascertained that it was not her money but that it belonged to the estate of Parsons, his intestate; that he had been appointed administrator of that estate, and that as such administrator he claimed the money. He attached copy of his letters of administration. Upon the trial of that case, the jury returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff against Hicks. Judgment was rendered, and an execution, issued thereon, was levied upon certain lands of Hicks. He then filed an equitable petition wherein he alleged the foregoing facts and further alleged the insolvency of Mrs. Braswell. He prayed an injunction restraining the sale of the land, and that the money might be decreed to be the property of the estate of Parsons.
It is a general rule, well recognized by all the courts, that a judgment against a person as an individual will not bind him as administrator. See discussion of this subject in Hukm Chand, Res Judicata, 158 et seq., particularly § 81; Bigelow, Estoppel, 130; 1 Herrman, Est. & Res Jud., § 94; 21 Am. & Eng. Ene. L. 134 et seq. There are, however, certain exceptions to this rule. One of these is, that where a person sued as an individual voluntarily pleads in that suit his rights in a representative capacity, as administrator, executor, guardian, or trustee, and the issue thus raised by his plea is passed upon by the court, a judgment in that suit binds him in both capacities, as an individual and as a representative. It is not necessary in order that the judgment should be so binding that an Order should be taken' making him party in his representative capacity. The fact that he pleads in that capacity and that the issue so raised by him is passed upon by the court binds him without a formal order making him a party in his representative capacity. As was said by Searls, C. J., in the case of Stockton Building & Loan Ass’n v. Chalmers, 75 Cal. 332, 7 Am. St. Rep. 173, quoted with approval by Hukm Chand (p. 182), “It may well be that a party who voluntarily files an answer in a cause without an order of court making him a party defendant, and who goes to trial upon the issues made by his answer to the complaint, will be concluded by the judgment rendered on the trial of such issues and estopped from ‘denying that he was a party to the action.” Hukm Chand adds: “ On the same principle, a decree in a suit brought by an executor in his own right, but -to which he was a necessary party as executor, and in which the rights of his testator are adjudicated, is conclusive between the administrator de bonis
Judgment reversed.