Burrow v. Brown

Citations

• 59 Tex. 457
• 1883 Tex. LEXIS 197

Syllabus

<p>1. Recording a judgment — Evidence.— The purchaser of land under execution issued from a justice’s court is not, in an action of trespass to try title, precluded from offering in evidence the unrecorded judgment of the magistrate. It is admissible to show the authority for issuing the execution.</p> <p>2. Deed by deputy sheriff. — -A deed assuming to convey property sold under execution, formal in other respects, and signed “E. E. Dunn, sheriff of Navarro county, by A. E. Miller, deputy,” is admissible as evidence of title after showing judgment, without proof that the party signing himself as deputy was really a deputy sheriff. The burden of showing the contrary rests on him who denies it, since the law will presume the existence of the official character.</p> <p>3. Continuance.— An application for continuance to procure testimony to support a title which, under the pleading, cannot be considered, should be overruled, and the court may properly look to the state of the pleading in passing on it.</p> <p>4. Continuance — Surprise.— When a party to an action of trespass to try title desires information as to the character of his adversary’s title, he should demand before trial an abstract thereof. If he fails to avail himself of this right, and goes into trial without requiring such abstract to be furnished him, he cannot after-wards complain of surprise on account of the evidences of title produced on the trial, when there has been no act or declaration of the opposing party calculated to mislead him.</p> <p>5. Same.— Much is left to the discretion of the judge trying a cause, in granting or refusing a continuance after the trial has begun; his action will not be cause for reversing a judgment, unless there has been a clear abuse of such discretion.</p>