83 So. 319 | La. | 1919
The heirs of John Fortner bring this action to establish title to real estate under the provisions of Act No. 38 of 1908, p. 38. They allege that they have the recorded title and that the Good Pine Lumber Company and the Trout Creek Lumber Company also have recorded titles to the same property, and they ask that they be adjudged the owners of said property.
Plaintiff filed an exception of no cause of action to the petition of Mrs. Ezell which was overruled. This was error. A bill of exceptions was reserved by plaintiffs to the ruling.
The suit brought by plaintiffs against the defendants was for the purpose of having determined the validity of the recorded titles held by those parties; and a judgment rendered therein could not affect any third parties, as set forth in Act No. 38. The petition of intervention changed the nature of the suit altogether. It was an action in a suit which was simply one to try title between two parties, neither of whom claimed possession.
Act 38 of 1908 was intended to give to two or more claimants to a piece of land who had recorded titles thereto, where no one of whom was in actual possession, the right to go into court and litigate their respective titles. The act specially provided that the actions thereunder should not conflict with or interfere with the petitory and possessory actions. As
The case proceeded to trial, and there was judgment in favor of the plaintiffs dnd against the defendants and the intervener; and the latter have appealed.
The only disputed point between the plaintiffs and the defendants is whether a sheriff’s sale relied on by plaintiffs was a sale in the matter of John Fortner v. I. B. Edwards, or John Fortner v. J. B. Edwards. Plaintiffs contend that the suit was that of John Fort-ner v. Ira B, Edwards, and that John Fort-ner bought the property from I. B. Edwards at a sheriff’s sale; that Fortner did not sell the property; and that title had passed to his heirs, the plaintiffs herein.
It appeared from the evidence that Ira B. Edwards bought the property in question from the United States government in the year 1858; that he borrowed part of the purchase price from John Fortner; that he was unable to pay same, and John Fortner sued Edwards, obtained judgment, and caused the property to be seized and sold to himself.
The evidence of plaintiffs shows that there was no J. B. Edwards in Catahoula parish at any time; that there was an I. B. Edwards; that I. B. Edwards was the same Edwards who acquired the land in question from the United States government; and that this Edwards was the same Edwards whose land was seized and sold by the sheriff, and bought in by Fortner.
It is ordered, adjudged, and decreed that the judgment appealed from be affirmed, with costs.