143 Ga. 837 | Ga. | 1915
This case differs from the case of Southern Express Co. v. Duffey, 48 Ga. 358. There a mother made a deed to procure the release of her son from arrest on a charge of felony. The son was under arrest and in chains, and the grantee in the deed agreed to release the son and stop the proceedings, but he refused to settle the prosecution because, he said he could not control the public authorities. The son was released and the proceedings were stopped. It was held that the deed was void in that case. The court, speaking through Judge MeCay, said: “If this arrest was illegal, if the agents of the express company had this boy in their own custody, and could let him go or not at their pleasure, then this deed was the clear result of duress, since it was made to release the child of the grantor from -illegal imprisonment. A man’s child stands, under the law, in the same situation as himself in such cases.” Jordan v. Beecher, 143 Ga. 143 (84 S. E. 549), was a case where a criminal warrant was issued, the principal object of which was to collect a debt due to a corporation, and the magistrate issuing the warrant was president of the corporation, and the defendant was arrested and imprisoned under the warrant. It was held that a conveyance of property by the person imprisoned, who had procured a deed from his wife, in order to secure his release, was void. In the instant case, the brothers of the plaintiff’s husband, who were the defendants, did not take out a warrant for plaintiff’s husband or threaten to do so, but, on the contrary, showed their purpose of helping him by settling with his creditors and thus preventing his prosecution. Both were creditors; and a debtor has a right to prefer one creditor to another. The plaintiff and her husband preferred the defendants. There is evidence tending to show
Judgment affirmed.