City of Raymondville v. Harding

SMITH, J.

As a matter of convenience, the plaintiff in error, the city of Raymondville, will be designated herein as plaintiff, as in the court below, and defendant in error W. A. Harding will be designated as defendant.

Plaintiff, an incorporated city of presumably less than 5,000 population, brought this action against defendant to recover city taxes levied against his real property for the years 1925,1926, 1927, 1928, and 1929. Upon a trial without a jury the court below rendered judgment that the city recover nothing, and it has appealed.

Upon the trial the plaintiff offered in evidence the delinquent tax rolls or lists for the years in question, which purported to show the lands belonging to defendant within the corporate limits of plaintiff corporation, together with the amounts of taxes reported delinquent upon said lands in said years, respectively. The trial cc„rt excluded said evidence upon defendant’s objection that no valid levy had been shown to have been made by plaintiff with reference to said property. Upon the same objection all -other evidence offered by plaintiff to prove up its case was rejected by the trial judge, who thereupon rendered judgment denying any recovery to plaintiff. In this we conclude the court erred.

It is provided in chapter 10, tit. 122 (article 7321), R. S. 1925, relating to the levy and collection of state and county taxes, that such lists “shall be prima facie evidence that all the requirements of the law have been complied with by the officers charged with any duty thereunder, as to the regularity of listing, assessing, levying of all taxes therein mentioned, and reporting as delinquent ⅜ ⅜ ⅝ any real estate whatsoever, and that the amount alleged against said real estate is a true and correct charge.” So is it provided in article 7326, that, where suit is brought by the county to collect such taxes, “all delinquent tax records of said county in any county where such suit is brought shall be prima facie evidence of the true and correct amount of taxes and costs due by the defendant or defendants in such suit, and the same or certified copies thereof shall be admissible in the trial of such suit as evidence thereof.” It is expressly provided in article 7337 that “any incorporated city or town or school district shall have the right to enforce the collection of delinquent taxes due it under the provisions of this chapter.” We are of the opinion that the provisions of chapter 10, above referred to, are made applicable to this case -by article 7337, -that the tax rolls and lists offered by the plaintiff were admissible for the purpose of making a prima facie case, and that the court erred in excluding them from evidence.

This conclusion settles -the appeal, and the judgment must be reversed, and the cause remanded.