Case ID: miss_87/html/0443-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Whitfield, C. J.,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Ethel Mabry Campbell et al. v. Henrietta C. Bright et al.
    Statute oe Frauds. Contract to convey land. Code 1892, §4225 (c).
    Under Code 1892, §4225 (e), providing that an action shall not be brought to charge a defendant upon any parol contract for the sale of lands, a parol agreement by the beneficiary in a trust deed, who contemplated bidding in the land at a sale under the deed, to convey the same to the grantor on his paying the indebtedness secured by the deed within a specified time, is not enforceable.
    Erom the chancery court of Lee county.
    Hon. William J. Lamb, Chancellor.
    Mrs. Bright and others, appellees, were complainants in the court below; Mrs. Campbell and another, appellants, were defendants there. Erom a decree favorable to complainants the defendants appealed to the supreme court.
    The bill sought to specifically enforce a parol agreement by which the purchaser of land at a trustee’s sale under a deed of trust promised, shortly before the sale, to recover the land to the grantor in the deed upon the payment to him, within a specified time, of the debt secured by the deed of trust. The bill was demurred to as being within the statute of frauds, but the court below overruled the demurrer.
    1*7. D. Anderson, and G. P. Long, for appellants.
    The question involved is solvable by the following authorities: Glearman v.'Cotton, 66 Miss., 467 (s.c., 6 South. Rep., 156) ; More v. Jordan, 65 Miss., 235 (s.c., 3 South. Rep., 737); Ragsdale v. Ragsdale, 68 Miss., 92 (s.c., 8 South. Rep., 315); Moore v. Grump, 84 Miss., 612 (s.c., 37 South. Rep., 109); Howland v. Blalce, 97 H. S., 624; Miazza v. Yerger, 53 Miss., 135; Rutland v. Brister, 53 Miss., 683.
    
      
      W. L. & 8. P. Olay ton, for appellees.
    The principle underlying a constructive trust, or trust ex maleficio, as it is sometimes called, is based on estoppel. Although the agreement or contract is, under the statute of frauds, unenforceable directly, still a court of equity will hold the grantee estopped — not to deny the contract, but to assert his title acquired in such a manner — and will not allow the grantee to set up the statute in support of his title. A court of equity, in other words, will hold the grantee estopped by his fraud in securing the property and constitute him a trustee, for the benefit of the grantor, as a convenient means of correcting the fraud.
    In order that such a trust may exist, it is unnecessary that any confidential relationship should exist. 15 Am. & Eng. Ency. Law (2d ed.), 1186.
   Whitfield, C. J.,

delivered the opinion of the court.

This case falls precisely within the cases of Miazza v. Yerger, 53 Miss., 135, and Clearman v. Cotton, 66 Miss., 467 (6 South. Rep., 156).

Reversed, and bill dismissed.