76 Iowa 751 | Iowa | 1888
— I. The plaintiff claims to hold the patent title, and the defendant claims title under a tax sale and deed. Each party introduced evidence tending to support the respective title under which he claims. The plaintiff, by an amended petition, alleges that, prior to the execution of the treasurer’s deed, the owner of the land, under whom plaintiff claims title, did, at the request of the purchaser, in redemption from the tax sale and deed, pay to the purchaser the full amount required to make redemption. The facts to be considered upon this defense aré these: The lands were purchased at tax sale by Hush Clark, who was an attorney at law. A witness testifies that he was a student in the office of Mr. Clark at Iowa City, and was acquainted with Hunt, the claimant of the patent title, who lived at
II. The payment to Clark was made and received to redeem the land from the tax sale. If that redemption is effective, Clark thereafter held no interest in, or claim to, the land under the tax sale ; and a deed executed thereafter conferred upon him no title or right. Upon this point there can be no doubt. The redemption is made by payment to the treasurer; and it may be that, strictly, a redemption made by payment to the purchaser would not be good as to a party, if any such there be, whose interest could not be affected, except upon notice of the redemption. But grantees or representatives of Clark acquired no higher title than was held by him. If for fraud or for any other reason his title was void, it would not be cured when it reached their hands, on the ground that they had no knowledge of the facts invalidating the title. A redemption from a tax sale divests the lien of the taxes, and leaves the land free therefrom, as though the taxes had been paid before the sale. Lake v. Gray, 35 Iowa, 44. It will not be claimed that a purchaser at a tax sale, where the taxes have been paid, will hold under a tax deed, if he shows he had no notice of the payment of taxes.
III. But counsel for defendant insist that the statute requires that redemption shall be made by payment to the county treasurer, and that, under the same statute, no one can question a tax title unless he shows title in
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