Case ID: mass_128/html/0470-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "By the Court.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Benjamin F. Colcord vs. Isaac W. McDonald.
    Suffolk.
    March 9.—10, 1880.
    Endicott & Soule, JJ., absent.
    Where the owner of a chattel, who has transferred the possession thereof to another person, with the agreement that it should become his property on the payment of a certain sum in weekly instalments, brings an action against a third person for a conversion of the chattel after payment of some of the instalments and a failure to pay the remainder, the measure of damages is the whole value of the property, with interest from the time of the conversion.
    Tort for conversion. The case was submitted to the Superior Court, and, after judgment for the plaintiff for $35 and costs, to this court on appeal, on an agreed statement of facts in substance as follows:
    The property in question was sold by the plaintiff to one Harrigan, upon a written lease or agreement signed by him, stipulating that he should pay $5 a week until the purchase price, $45, was paid, and that the property should remain in the plaintiff until paid for. Harrigan was in arrears upon all the payments, but the plaintiff accepted from time to time various sums, until all but $13 of the agreed price was paid. Harrigan mortgaged the property, and the mortgagee brought a writ of replevin against Harrigan, and the defendant, as a constable, served the writ and took and removed the property. After the taking, and while removing the same, the plaintiff made due demand upon the defendant for the property, which was then worth $35.
    If, upon these facts, the plaintiff could recover the full value of the property, judgment was to be entered for him for $35 and costs; otherwise, for $13 and costs.
    N. B. Bryant, for the defendant.
    G. S. Littlefield, for the plaintiff.
   By the Court.

The case is governed by former decisions. Angier v. Taunton Paper Co. 1 Gray, 621. Carter v. Kingman, 103 Mass. 517. Judgment affirmed.