Case ID: cal_54/html/0145-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Department No. 1, McKee, J.:", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

[No. 5,990.]
    DENT v. HOLBROOK.
    Conversion — Stock—Measure of Damages — Retroactive Amendment.— Prior to the amendment of January 22nd, 1878, to the Civil Code, § 3336, the defendant converted certain stock of the plaintiff. Held—upon appeal from a judgment rendered subsequently to the amendment, in an action for the conversion of the stock, commenced prior to the amendment—that the plaintiff was entitled to recover the damages prescribed in the section as amended, to wit, the highest market value of the stock at any time between the conversion and the verdict.
    Appeal from a judgment for the plaintiff in the Twelfth District Court, City and County of San Francisco. Daingerfield, J.
    Action for the conversion, by the defendant, of certain stock pledged to him by the plaintiff. The amended complaint was filed March 6th, 1877. The stock ivas sold for $319, at the regular session of the Board of Brokers, on September 13th, 1876, but without the notice required by law. January 23rd, 1877, the plaintiff tendered the amount of his indebtedness, and demanded a return of the stock. At the former date the stock was worth about what it sold for, and at the latter $1,237.50. The Court gave judgment, Feb. 7th, 1878, for $723.50, with interest, being the latter amount less the plaintiff’s indebtedness.
    
      Robert Harrison, for Appellants.
    It is alleged in the complaint, and the evidence showed, that the conversion took place in December, 1876, and the measure of damages is admitted to be the value of the shares at the time of conversion.
    
      Du Brutz & Dickinson, for Respondents.
    The judgment is sustained by § 3336 of the Civil Code, as amended January 22nd, 1878.
   Department No. 1, McKee, J.:

An unauthorized sale by a stock-broker of certificates of shares of stock in a mining corporation on which the broker has a lien for payment of part of the purchase-money, is a conversion, for which the owner of the certificates is entitled to recover, as damages, the highest market value of the stock, at any time between the conversion and the verdict, without interest. (Code Civ. Proc. § 3336, as amended January 22nd, 1878.)

The judgment appealed from is sustainable upon this principle, except as to interest, which was allowed by the Court; in that regard it is erroneous. But the amount of the interest, as appears by the record, was $75. Subtracting that from the judgment there remains $723.50, for which the plaintiff is entitled to judgment.

Thus modified, the judgment is affirmed.

McKinstry, P. J., and Ross, J., concurred.