DocketNumber: Docket No. 48
Citation Numbers: 192 Mich. 684
Judges: Bird, Brooke, Kuhn, Moore, Ostrander, Person, Steere, Stone
Filed Date: 9/26/1916
Status: Precedential
Modified Date: 9/8/2022
The parties to this suit were married in August, 1910, and separated in August, 1913. They are young people. Defendant a short time before the marriage graduated at the Detroit Medical School, and began his professional life at Halfway, in Macomb, county. Two children came to them; Richard in May, 1911, and the other child was born after they separated. Richard was drowned when about two years old. In August, 1913, complainant filed her bill for divorce, charging defendant with extreme cruelty. Defendant answered denying complainant’s charges, and filed a cross-bill. In his cross-bill he charged complainant with extreme cruelty, and alleged that the extreme cruelty was the result of her drinking intoxicating liquors. In this connection he charges that
Defendant testified to the several acts of cruelty alleged in his cross-bill, and complainant denied most of them, and justified her acts as to others. The storm center of the testimony soon gathered around the question of her indulgence in intoxicating liquors. The defendant testified that she was intoxicated as often as once a week the first year, and oftener after that. Complainant denied that she bought or drank liquor. She produced a large number of witnesses to disprove the charge. Only a small part of this testimony, however, was of any value, because while the witnesses had known her prior to her marriage, they had known and seen very little of her since her marriage. Defendant showed sales of liquor to her by a saloon keeper who kept a place near by, and a servant girl testified that she had gotten liquor for her on two occasions, and had seen her take whisky and hot water on one occasion, but admitted that she had never seen her intoxicated. Complainant admits that she took liquor when she was ill, and we think it is clearly established that she bought some liquor and served it on occasions to callers and invited guests, but no witness on either side, save the defendant, testified having seen her in a state of intoxication. The people who would be apt to know something of her habit, if it existed, were the servants in the household and the neighbors.
The decree of the trial court is affirmed, with costs to complainant.