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108 Mich. 417

Gill v. Backus

Michigan Supreme Court

Decided February 26, 1896

Michigan Supreme Court · decided 1896-02-26

Debt by George A. Gill against Absalom Backus, Jr., Joseph Van Buskirk, and Bernard P. Cowley, upon a bond given for the release of property attached under the log-lien law. From a judgment for plaintiff on verdict directed by the court, defendants bring error.

Relies on People ex rel. Clinton v. Rice

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Affirmed · Decided 1896-02-26

How this case has been cited

Cited by 3 later decisions — most recently February 1938

3 state decisions

1018961900191019201930decided

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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Hooker, J.

¶1Gill brought an action in circuit court by attachment, under the log-lien law, against Morrill & Morrill, copartners, claiming a lien for $135 upon certain lumber. Backus intervened as owner of the lumber, and *418gave a bond for the release thereof. The trial resulted in a verdict in favor of Gill for 1105.64 damages, $52.50 thereof being found to be a lien upon the lumber. Judgment was rendered upon the verdict, for the. damages aforesaid, and concluded as follows:

“And it is further considered, ordered, and adjudged that the said plaintiff do have a lien upon the property-described in his declaration in this cause to the amount of fifty-two dollars and fifty cents, with his costs, disbursements, charges, and expenses of suit to be taxed, and that the plaintiff have execution thereof.”

¶2Costs were taxed at $45.56.

¶3In an action upon the bond, the plaintiff recovered $101.98, made up as follows: The damages to amount of lien, $52.50; costs taxed, $45.56; interest, $3.92.

¶4The only question raised in the case is the validity of the judgment for costs in the original attachment case, it being contended that the defendant, and not the plaintiff, should be entitled to costs where the amount recovered in circuit court is less than $100. The defendant Backus took no steps to review the judgment in the attachment case,. and, as the bond undertakes to pay the judgment, neither Backus nor the sureties can question the judgment, unless it is void in whole or in part upon its face. Clinton v. Laning, 73. Mich. 284; Clinton v. Rice, 79 Mich. 359. The circuit court had jurisdiction of the case, inasmuch as the amount of lien claimed in the affidavit exceeded $100 over and above all legal set-offs. 3 How. Stat. § 8427g. No claim is made that it had not jurisdiction of the parties. Section 8427Í permits a recovery of costs, and their collection by sale of the property attached. The most that can be claimed by the appellants is that, under 2 How. Stat. § 8967, the court should not have awarded costs to the plaintiff, and should have given the defendant costs, inasmuch as the jury found that the lien was less than $100. But this was at most an irregularity, which could only be corrected by proceedings in that *419cause. The judgment cannot be collaterally impeached. It therefore becomes unnecessary to discuss the other questions in the case.

¶5The judgment is affirmed.

The other Justices concurred.
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