Scottish Court of Session Decisions

This is an action of filiation and aliment advocated from the Sheriff Court of Lanarkshire. The Sheriff-Substitute (Logie) assoilzied the defender, holding that the pursuer had failed to prove the paternity libelled, but the Sheriff (Alison) altered his Substitute's interlocutor. The Court to-day unanimously altered the Sheriff's judgment, and reverted to that of the Sheriff-Substitute.

The Lord President said—This is a case of filiation. The pursuer having given birth to an illegitimate child, asserts that the defender is the father. She says so on oath, and that the defender is the only person with whom she ever had connection. She had told a similar story to a person in whose house she was living at the time of the birth. But her own statement is not enough, and we have therefore to see whether she is corroborated. There is no doubt that the pursuer was living in the defender's house, and was often in his room at night rubbing his limbs, so that there was opportunity. But this is not sufficient, although when coupled with previous familiarity and the pursuer's evidence it is generally conclusive. The defender denies that he is the father, and states a number of circumstances which really form the strongest evidence we have of the opportunity I have referred to. These might be regarded as sufficient evidence of familiarity also had there not been explanations by the medical man examined as to the illness the defender suffered from, and for which he had prescribed friction. There were also circumstances in regard to the position of the parties which make it not very presumable that there was connection. The defender was a relation of the pursuer, and had given employment to different members of her family. He also seems to have taken a sort of charge of the pursuer and her sister, whose parents lived in the Highlands. The corroborative circumstances are very few indeed beyond the opportunity which, as I have said, is explained without reference to any improper design. The fact that the pursuer has produced a child proves that she had connection with somebody, but nothing more. In regard to the pursuer's credibility there are circumstances disclosed which tend to shake in some degree one's confidence in her. There is a story about a person of the name of Ramsay being probably the father of her child. I don't say he was the father, but it is clear that the pursuer had represented that he had been in the house one night, and appeared close to her bed and given her a fright. Some witnesses go further, and say that she had said that he had been in her bed. It is also pretty clear that her father, mother, and sister had at one time been under the belief that Ramsay had been the author of her pregnancy. Whence did they derive that impression? It is said the father derived it not from the pursuer, but secondhand from her sister, and the sister says she only inferred it from what the pursuer told her. It is therefore clear, at all events, that the pursuer had given her family to understand that Ramsay was the father. She did so down to a comparatively late period. It is said there was no ground for making the accusation if another was really the father. It is difficult to get at a party's motives, but it is pretty clear that the pursuer and her friends were not on very good terms with the defender. She had had disagreements with him, and there was a strong feeling of enmity towards him on the part of her parents, not on account of his being the father, but because he allowed her when in his house to get into the condition she did. All this ultimately settled down into an accusation against the defender. On the whole, I think there is not sufficient corroboration of the pursuer, and that the case has not been established against the defender.