85 S.W.2d 711 | Ark. | 1935
On January 11, 1935, Ethel E. Smith and her husband, J. C. W. Smith, filed an action in the Lonoke Circuit Court against the Magnolia Petroleum Company, a foreign corporation, and against the petitioners, Jim Meeks and Ewell Smith, to recover damages for personal injuries alleged to have been sustained by the plaintiff, Ethel Smith, caused by their joint negligence in painting a strip across the sidewalk adjacent to a filling station, in the city of Little Rock, owned by the Magnolia Petroleum Company and operated by the petitioners as servants and employees, in that she stepped upon the wet paint on the sidewalk, slipped, fell and was injured thereby. Service was had upon the Magnolia Petroleum Company in Lonoke County by delivering a copy of the summons to its agent therein. Service was had upon the petitioners in Pulaski County, they being residents and citizens thereof. Thereafter, in apt time, they appeared in the Lonoke Circuit Court, especially for the purpose, filed their intention to quash the service had upon them and objected to the jurisdiction of the court on this ground. The court overruled the motion to quash the service, and held that it had jurisdiction of the parties. They thereafter filed their petition in this court for a writ of prohibition against W. J. Waggoner, judge of the Lonoke Circuit Court, in which they alleged want of proper service upon them and lack of jurisdiction of the person of the petitioners by the Lonoke Circuit Court. *190
Plaintiffs and petitioners are all residents of Pulaski County and the Magnolia Petroleum Company, the other defendant to the action, has its principal Arkansas office and place of business in Little Rock in said county. However the latter is a foreign corporation, doing business in Lonoke County, and has an agent and place of business therein. It seems to be conceded that the Magnolia Petroleum Company has been properly served with process in Lonoke County, and it is not a party to this proceeding. The petitioners contended with some degree of force and justice that, since they are residents of Pulaski County, and since plaintiffs in the action in Lonoke County are also residents of Pulaski County, and since all the witnesses reside in Pulaski County, and the Magnolia Petroleum Company has its principal office and place of business in said county, the action should have been brought in Pulaski County where all the parties reside, and they should not be compelled to go out of the county of their residence to defend the action.
The Legislature however prescribes the venue of actions and the manner of serving summons upon defendants, and with the wisdom of its action in such matters the courts have nothing to do. After prescribing the venue of actions in many particular cases, it is provided by 1176, Crawford Moses' Digest, as follows: "Every other action may be brought in any county in which the defendant, or one of several defendants, resides, or is summoned."
The joint defendant, Magnolia Petroleum Company, has been properly served in Lonoke County, therefore, under the plain provisions of 1176, the petitioners were properly brought into the action in the Lonoke Circuit Court. One of the three defendants was properly summoned in Lonoke County. Therefore the venue was properly laid as to the other defendants, petitioners herein. As said by Mr. Justice FRAUENTHAL in Wernimont v. State,
In Metzger v. Mann,
The writ will be denied. *192