25 Haw. 623 | Haw. | 1920
Section 2472 E. L. 1915 provides that “In addition to the jurisdiction in equity otherwise conferred, the several circuit judges shall have original and exclusive jurisdiction of every original process whether by bill, writ, petition or otherwise, in which relief in equity is prayed for, except when a different provision is made,” etc.
Under this statute it cannot be doubted that the several circuit courts throughout the Territory possess concurrent jurisdiction of matters where relief in equity is prayed for without regard to where the rem is located or where in the Territory the parties may be domiciled. This is the interpretation and the effect of the statute as announced by this court in Wailuku Sugar Co. v. Cornwell, 10 Haw. 476, 479, and again in McBryde Sugar Co.
All of the parties interested reside on the Island of Kauai and within the fifth judicial circuit; the Island of Kauai is approximately 80 miles by water from the Island of Oahu where the circuit court of the first judicial circuit functions. There is no pretense at any showing in the bill or otherwise why the parties should be required to undergo the expense and inconvenience of a sea voyage from Kauai to Honolulu and here remain in attendance until the cause is tried and determined in the circuit court of the first circuit when the circuit court of the fifth circuit, which sits in equity at all times, at Lihue, Kauai, could try the issues with less expense and inconvenience to all concerned. If the petitioner can as a matter of right compel the respondents to come to Honolulu to defend this cause then, as pertinently remarked by the judge of the court below, he might with equal right have instituted his suit before the circuit court at Hilo on the Island of Hawaii, some 250 miles distant from Kauai, and thus have required the attendance of the respondents upon the court there. It seems to us that equity and good conscience would refuse to sanction any such imposition. While equity suits are cognizable by the several circuit courts in the Territory it does not follow that a complainant in equity enjoys as a matter of right a roving commission to institute and maintain his suit in any of the circuit courts which he may choose. See
The attempt of the petitioner in the present case to draw the respondents away from the jurisdiction where all the parties reside was properly held by the judge of the court below to be inequitable and unjust.
The decree appealed from is affirmed.