Gazzam v. Reading

Citations

• 202 Pa. 231
• 51 A. 1000
• 1902 Pa. LEXIS 499

Syllabus

<p>Practice, O. P. — New trial — Eraud-After-discovered evidence.</p> <p>An order discharging a rule to vacate a judgment entered on a verdict and for a new trial on the ground of fraud, and after-discovered evidence, is a matter within the sound discretion of the court below sitting in chancery, and while such an order is not conclusive upon the appellate court, it has great persuasiveness.</p> <p>In an action by one woman against another to recover damages for the alienation of the affections of plaintiff’s husband, a judgment on a verdict for the plaintiff will not be vacated on an allegation that the plaintiff was not a good, true, faithful and honest woman, and that her husband had separated from her because of her misconduct, where the record of the whole ease shows that the defendant had a whole year before the trial to ascertain plaintiff’s character, and that it could have been known to the defendant as well at the trial as subsequently.</p> <p>New trial — Judgment—Equity.</p> <p>Equity will rarely open or set aside a judgment at law; it will never do so where the party could have availed himself of the objection at the trial, or was not prevented from doing so by the fraud of his antagonist. A court of equity will never move merely to save a party from the consequences of his own laches and negligence. The equity of the complainant must be free from doubt. The result, a judgment reached by litigation, should, unless clearly unjust, be an end of strife. Every suitor in a dispute involving life, liberty, property or reputation, in entitled by right to one trial, but not to two; if he gets more than one, it is of grace, not because of a fundamental right.</p> <p>The bill or petition for relief from a judgment at law, must be specific in its statement of facts that constitute a fraud. A charge in general terms that a transaction was fraudulent is not sufficiently definite; the particulars must be set forth in detail. Fraud is a conclusion of law; the things do