1 Cal. App. 2d 634 | Cal. Ct. App. | 1934
By this proceeding in certiorari petitioner seeks to annul a judgment of the superior court entered after trial de novo of a case appealed from the small claims court sitting in the city of Los Angeles.
One Anna May Brown filed an affidavit in the small claims court substantially in the form required by section 927b of the Code of Civil Procedure, claiming that petitioner herein was indebted to her in the sum of $37 for money had and received. Trial was duly had thereon and judgment was entered in favor of Mrs. Brown for the sum of $30. Within five days thereafter petitioner appealed to the superior court from such judgment, in accordance with
It is patent that the affidavit filed in the small claims court effectually invoked the jurisdiction of that court in respect to the subject-matter therein, but it is contended that during the trial facts were presented in evidence which deprived the court of such jurisdiction. Briefly stated, petitioner’s contention is that the $30 awarded by the judgment in that court comprised two items of a list of items going to make up a total which had been previously agreed upon between the parties as the amount which petitioner would accept in consideration of a dismissal of an action in the superior court between the parties, wherein petitioner was seeking to foreclose a street bond lien on Mrs. Brown’s real property and a reinstatement of her bond; that petitioner had accepted such total amount and had dismissed such action and reinstated the bond, and that Mrs. Brown had never rescinded that agreement and therefore no cause of action for money had and received existed, and no jurisdiction was vested in the small claims court to adjudge rescission and repayment. The items in question were $25 for attorney’s fee and $5 for title search, represented by petitioner to Mrs. Brown as having been incurred but which in truth had not been incurred. The record certified up and before us shows that the evidence given in each court reveals the facts substantially as stated above.
It is a settled rule in this state that the judgment of an inferior court will not be reviewed on certiorari after appeal taken therefrom and determination of such appeal in the superior court. (Roberts v. Police Court, 185 Cal. 65 [195 Pac. 1053].) The writ herein is directed to a review of the action of the superior court; its functions are limited to such acts of that court as were in excess of its jurisdiction and no irregularities or errors of the small
To the general rule that the sufficiency of the evidence to support the judgment of the trial court will not be reviewed on certiorari there is, however, an exception which permits the review of the evidence given in the court below when the question is whether jurisdictional facts were or were not proved. (Garvin v. Chambers, 195 Cal. 212 [232 Pac. 696]; Roberts v. Police Court, supra.) But this exception has no application whatever to a tribunal, invested with jurisdiction to try and determine a fact in issue, with reference to proof of that fact. In such a case that fact is not what is called a “jurisdictional fact”. It is the fact to be determined by the court having jurisdiction to determine it; and the determination of the court thereon is not void, however defective the evidence (where there is any substantial evidence) upon which it is based. (Roberts v. Police Court, supra.)
The fact in issue in both the small claims court and the superior court was whether petitioner owed money to Mrs. Brown. The complaint filed in the small claims court clearly stated a proper case within that court’s jurisdiction.
The writ is discharged.
Stephens, P. J., and Desmond, J., concurred.