3 Blackf. 344 | Ind. | 1834
On the 23d day of. October, 1832, a writ of sci. fa. issued out of the office of the clerk of the Circuit Court of the county of Morgan, summoning Lang, the plaintiff in error, to show cause if any he could show, why the state of Indiana should not have execution against him for the amount of a certain recognizance, &c. The sci. fa. alleges that the hon. Hiram Matthews, one of the associate judges of said Court, did on a certain day, file in said clerk’s office a certain recognizance, which is set forth in hmc verba; and that afterwards, at a certain term of said Court, Lang was called and defaulted, the recognizance made absolute, and the writ of sci. fa. awarded. This is in substance all that the sci. fa. contains. To this writ, an issue in law was made upon a general demurrer, and the demurrer was overruled, and judgment rendered in favour of the state that she have execution, &c.
Several exceptions are taken to the judgment, record, and proceedings. First, It is said that the recognizance is insufficient, upon its face, to authorise the proceedings had, in consequence of the uncertainty as it respects the time when the recognizors were bound to appear and answer. This objection we think is not well taken; the recognizance as to that is sufficiently- certain to authorise the proceedings, if it is in every other particular regular, legal, and valid.
The next objection is a very general one, and applies to the whole record and proceedings. This Court has said, in the case of Andress v. The State
There are many other defects in the record, but it would be a useless waste of time to notice them all specially. The whole record taken together is certainly without precedent; it neither contains the form nor the substance of a record of the Circuit Court. It is simply a copy of various papers and minutes of the order book, without either a placita or parties: in which there is not, substantially and directly, a single fact stated. A record should be a legal, logical, and succinct statement of facts, and not a literal copy of the papers, minutes, and evidence, by which the facts might be proved. The transcript presented to us is not even certified as is required by statute. .The statute requires that the clerks of the Circuit Courts shall
In disposing of the objections raised to this record, we have not looked behind the writ of sci.fa.; all the proceedings up to the time of issuing that writ may be regular, correct, and legal, on which available proceedings may be had, and therefore we give no opinion respecting them.
The judgment is reversed, and the cause remanded, &c.
Ante, p. 108.