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101 Ark. 358

State v. Perkins

Supreme Court of Arkansas

Decided January 1, 1912

Supreme Court of Arkansas · decided 1912-01-01

Haden Humphreys, Chancellor; STATEMENT BY THE COURT. This suit was brought by the prosecuting attorney in the name of the State for the use of the county and the various school districts therein to set aside a judgment and order of the county court of Marion County of July 15, 1903, confirming the settlement of the defendant as the collector of the county, on account of fraud, and recover a balance claimed to be due from him, it being alleged that certain sums of money were…

Relies on State v. Wood · Jobe v. Caldwell · Jones v. State ex rel. Pope County

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

affirmed · Decided 1912-01-01

How this case has been cited

Cited by 11 later decisions — most recently December 1976

11 state decisions

401912192019301940195019601970decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Kirby, J.,

¶1(after stating the facts.) It is undisputed that the defendant was the collector of Marion County, and collected the revenues for 1902, and made settlement thereof with the county clerk in 1903, which settlement was duly approved and confirmed by the county court in July, 1903; that in said settlement he charged and was allowed and credited with five per cent, commission upon the revenues collected, and was entitled under the law to but three and a half per cent., the difference between which and the five per cent, being the amount sued for herein.

¶2The county court had jurisdiction to examine the settlement made by the clerk with the collector and approve or reject the same, and .its judgment approving and confirming the gettlement conclusive of its correctness. Jones v. State, 14 Ark. 170; Hunnicutt v. Kirkpatrick, 39 Ark. 172; State v. Wood, 51 Ark. 205; Ireland v. State, 99 Ark. 23; Crawford v. Carson, 35 Ark. 581.

¶3The county court also had the power to correct any error discovered in such settlement, and to reconsider and adjust the same within two years from the date thereof (section 7174, Kirby’s Digest), and the chancery court, after the expiration of said time allowed the county court by law for the correction of errors in such settlements, has jurisdiction to grant relief upon allegation and proof of fraud. State v. Turner, 49 Ark. 311.

¶4The collector, and his deputy, who had had experience in making such settlements, and the judge of the county court, all knew that the collector was charging five per cent, commission, and being allowed credit therefor at the time the settlement was made and confirmed, and the settlement itself showed that fact, and there was no evidence whatever of any fraud or concealment practiced upon the court to procure the confirmation of the settlement.

¶5The testimony further disclosed that the collectors in that county had theretofore charged and been credited with a commission of five per cent, for the collection of the taxes, and that the officials understood that that was the rate allowed by law.

¶6It is true that the statement from the Auditor’s office in 1911 showed that, after the settlement was approved and confirmed, and when the collector was paying the revenues into the State treasury, they discovered that upon the whole amount collected three and one half per cent, was the amount allowed by law, and required him to pay into the treasury the difference between that and the five per cent, credited by the county court upon the State’s revenues. This fact was notice to him that he had charged and been allowed by the judgment of the county court one and one-half per cent, more commission on the State revenues than the law entitled him to, and probably that he had charged and been allowed for the collection of the county revenues the same amount more than the law warranted, but, all this occurred after the settlement was made, approved and confirmed, and could not have had effect to charge him with notice at the making of the settlement that he was demanding fees not allowed by law, nor have conduced to. prove any fraud practiced by him in procuring confirmation of said settlement. Fraud is never presumed, but must be proved, and there was no proof of any fraud or concealment practiced on the county court in securing the confirmation of the collector’s settlement; and, even if the charge and allowance of five-per cent, commission, instead of three and one-half, the right percentage, can be considered evidence of fraud, certainly it can not be said the chancellor’s finding in this case is clearly against the weight of the evidence, and his judgment dismissing the bill for want of equity is affirmed.

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