Case ID: ill-app_194/html/0149-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. Justice Higbee", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Anna E. Page, Defendant in Error, v. W. R. Wright, Plaintiff in Error.
    (Hot to he reported in full.)
    Error to the Circuit Court oí Fayette county; the Hon. Jambs C. McBride, Judge, presiding.
    Heard in this court at the October term, 1914.
    Affirmed,
    Opinion filed May 1, 1915.
    
      Certiorari denied by Supreme Court (making opinion final).
    Statement of the Case.
    Anna E. Page, the owner of a livery stock including an automobile, a gasoline engine and lighting outfit, and some other articles, sold the same to C. E. Wilson for $2,000, he giving in part payment his note for $1,025 due April 1,1913, secured by a chattel mortgage on the livery outfit. On March 29, 1913, Wilson took up this note by executing a judgment note to Mrs. Page for $1,045.95 due ninety days after date, and also secured such note by chattel mortgage on the livery stock, which mortgage was duly acknowledged and recorded on April 5, 1913. On April 2, 1913, C. N. Cruse, a brother-in-law of Wilson, signed a note with him as his surety for $250, payable to the Ramsey Bank, and Wilson gave him a second mortgage on the livery stock for $600 to protect him. When the renewal mortgage matured, there being then due and unpaid upon it the sum of $1,060, Mrs. Page obtained a bill of sale from Wilson for the property named in the mortgage; and an arrangement was made that Wilson should hold the property for her use and keep account of the business done by him. It was also arranged that Wilson might sell the property if he could do so, and if anything was left after paying Page’s indebtedness, he was to have it. Shortly afterwards, Wilson secured W. R. Wright to assist him in trying to dispose of the stock, and through this action Wright became acquainted with the manner in which Wilson was holding the stock; and on learning that the bill of sale was not recorded, informed Wilson that the lien was invalid, and offered to buy the property of him. Cruse, with Wilson’s consent, turned over the $600 mortgage to Wright who then paid off Wilson’s note to the bank for $250, upon which Cruse was surety, and certain other notes owed by Wilson, amounting in all to $855; and thereupon Wilson gave him possession of the mortgaged property. Afterwards Wright sold the automobile for $150, and the livfery stock proper to Lee and Gilbert for $1,000, leaving the gasoline engine, lighting plant and oil tank, valued at $300, on hand.
    Abstract of the Decision.
    Fraudulent conveyances, § 308
      
      —when ptirchaser in violation of Bulk Sales Law liable to personal judgment. Where the plaintiff sold a livery stock taking back a chattel mortgage thereon, which was duly recorded, the purchaser then giving a creditor a second mortgage, and at the maturity of the first mortgage gave the plaintiff a bill of sale of the property and agreed to sell it for the plaintiff's benefit, but later conspired with the defendant, who had learned that the bill of sale was void because not recorded, and sold him the property without complying with the Bulk Sales Law, and the latter paid off the second mortgage and then sold the property to a third person, held that the sale to the defendant was void for noncompliance with the Bulk Sales Law, and that in a chancery suit against him a personal decree could be rendered in favor of the plaintiff for the amount due him under his bill of sale.
    
      Mrs. Page contended that the sale from Wilson to Wright was not in accordance with the provisions of the statute in regard to sales in bulk.
    A decree was entered against Wright in favor of Mrs. Page for $1,060, with interest at the rate of five per cent, per annum from the 1st day of October, 1913, and the costs of suit, from which the defendant appeals.
    F. M. Guinn and E. B. Spurgeon, for plaintiff in error; Prettyman, Velde & Prettyman, of counsel.
    Albert & Albert, for defendant in error.
    
      
      See Illinois Notes Digest, Vols. XI to XV, and Cumulative Quarterly, same touic and section number.
    
   Mr. Justice Higbee

delivered the opinion of the court.

McBbide, J., having tried this case in the court below, took no part on the hearing in this court.