55 So. 481 | Miss. | 1911
delivered the opinion of the court.
The appellee, S. E. Eees, sued the appellant, the town of Purvis, in a court of a justice of the peace, and recovered judgment by default, from which the appellant appealed to the circuit court, where the appeal was dismissed, on the ground that it had not been taken within five days from the rendition of the judgment, from which judgment of dismissal the appellant prosecutes an appeal to this court.
Judgment was. rendered by the justice of the peace on November 9, 1908. The appellant, for some reason not sufficiently explained, filed two petitions for appeal, either one of which is sufficient in spbstanee and form. Both petitions are dated November 10, 1908, and pur
Section 94, Code of 1906, dispenses with tbe necessity of municipalities giving appeal bonds; and section 95, Code of 1906, provides that in all cases where an appeal is desired from a judgment of a justice of tbe peace by a party who is not required to give bond therefor, a written demand for an appeal shall be filed in lieu of tbe bond required by others, within tbe time allowed for-appeals in such cases. Tbe testimony,- other than that of the justice of tbe peace, for tbe purpose of showing that neither of tbe petitions for appeal was filed within five days of tbe rendition of tbe judgment appealed from, was wholly insufficient; in fact, tbe testimony of tbe justice of tbe peace was all that really tended to establish that fact. In Duncan v. Gerdine, 59 Miss. 550, a deputy sheriff was held to be incompetent to give testimony contradicting tbe return made by him on a writ; and in Stone v. Montgomery, 35 Miss. 83, it was held that an officer, tailing and certifying an acknowledgment to a conveyance, was incompetent as a witness to impeach tbe statements of fact in bis official certificate.