79 Mo. App. 198 | Mo. Ct. App. | 1899
This suit was instituted in the circuit court of Greene county on the fourteenth of January, 1898. Plaintiff had judgment for $186.50, which not having been entered! of record at the time of its rendition, the court made a nimc pro twne entry thereof on the twelfth day of April, 1898, to wit::
Account trial by court. Judgment for plaintiff for $186.50. “Charles Nevatt, Plaintiff, v. “Springfield Normal School, a corporation, Defendant.
“Now on this 14th day of January, 1898, comes on said cause to be heard, plaintiff appears in person and by attorney, and the court having heard the evidence and all things being-considered, finds that the defendant is a corporation duly organized under the laws of this state, and that the cause of action herein accrued in this county, and that at the time the summons herein was issued and from that time to the present, the said defendant had no office or place of business in this county, and at the time said summons was issued, and during the said time the president and chief officer of said corporation could not be found in this county. And it appears to the-court that defendant has been duly served with process in Henry county, Missouri, by the sheriff of said Henry county, on the 4th day of December, 1897, by delivering to John E. Fesler, the president of said corporation in Henry county, a copy of the writ of summons and a copy of the petition herein, apd that the defendant has failed to file herein any answer, demurrer or other pleading within the time prescribed by law, but makes default, and it is now ordered that the default of defendant be entered. And the evidence having been heard
“It is therefore ordered and adjudged that the plaintiff have and recover of and from the defendant the sum of one hundred and eighty-six .50 dollars ($186.50) and his costs herein laid out and expended, for all which execution may issue.”
An execution issued on this judgment, upon which defendant Hindman was- garnished. His answer to the interrogatories was denied and issues joined. Hpon his motion a change of venue was granted to Lawrence county. At the August term of the circuit of that county he moved to dismiss the garnishment proceedings and for an allowance to himself, upon the suggestion that the judgment against the original defendant was rendered without service of process, and hence void. The learned trial judge acceded to this view, dismissed the garnishment proceedings, and discharged the garnishee, from which ruling plaintiff appealed.
The learned counsel for respondent cites Story v. Ins. Co., 61 Mo. App. 531. That case merely passed on the sufficiency of the return in the county where the suit was brought, the question of its sufficiency being raised upon a direct attack by writ of error. Obviously it has no bearing on the point under discussion. Neither does Gate City Electric Co. v. Corby, same volume, touch the point under review. In that case the court merely held that a judgment was void which was based upon a return (preserved in the record) which showed on its face no service upon the defendant, and that a garnishee was entitled upon showing that fact to be discharged, which is in accordance with the well settled rule.
Our conclusion is that the trial court erred in sustaining the motion of the garnishee for the dismissal of this proceeding against him. The judgment herein is therefore reversed and the cause remanded.