Bruce v. Bruce

HART, J.

This is an action by the plaintiff for a divorce from the defendant.

The parties intermarried in the month of March, 1896, the defendant having previously been married and raised a family of children by his former wife.

An interlocutory decree, adjudging plaintiff to be entitled to a divorce, was rendered and entered.

The decree, however, assigned to the defendant the homestead of the parties and awarded to the plaintiff, as alimony for her permanent support and maintenance, the lump sum of $4,500, with interest thereon at the rate of seven per cent per annum., from the date of the rendering of said judgment until said sum is paid, the same to be a lien on the homestead property referred to.

[355]

This appeal is by plaintiff from said last-stated portion of the decree.

The sole ground for the divorce, as set out in the complaint, is extreme cruelty, charged to have been committed by the defendant on the plaintiff for a series of years by various and numerous alleged violent acts and words on the part of the former.

The complaint further alleges that the defendant “is the owner and possessor of a large amount of real and personal property of the value of about $28,000, from which he received a large amount of rents and profits, which amount plaintiff is unable to state exactly, but on information and belief alleges that it amounts to as much as $3,500 annually. ’ ’

Proceeding further, the complaint declares that, since the intermarriage of plaintiff and defendant, the latter acquired a certain piece of real property, situated in Kings county, and upon which the plaintiff, after the acquisition of the same by defendant, duly made, executed and caused to be duly recorded a declaration of homestead, etc., but that, since the twentieth day of June, 1908, defendant has "prevented plaintiff from residing upon said premises or any part thereof; that said defendant “has received the rents, issues and profits of said property and is now receiving the same, and has appropriated and now appropriates the whole thereof to his own uses and purposes, the amount of which, plaintiff alleges, upon information and belief, is the sum of about $3,000 annually.”