Case ID: ohio_10/html/0162-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Wood, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

*The Lessee of Richard Douglas v. James Dunlap and others.
    A judgment against a grantee, in a deed made to defraud creditors, binds the estate, and a purchaser under such judgment, whether he has notice of the fraud or not, acquires a good title as against the fraudulent grantor, or a subsequent purchaser from him.
    A deed made to defraud creditors is void only as against creditors.
    This is an action of ejectment from the county of Fayette.
    A verdict was taken for the defendant, and the plaintiff moves for a new trial.
    The plaintiff’s lessor claimed title to the premises, under a conveyance from Adam Funk, and the defendants, as the heirs at law of Adam Stewart.
    The facts are these: Adam Funk, being insolvent, executed a deed to his son, Absalom, admitted by both grantor and grantee to defraud the creditors of the grantor. A judgment was afterward obtained against Absalom, execution issued, and the land so conveyed levied on and sold in satisfaction of the judgment of Stewart, to whom the sheriff executed a conveyance. The plaintiff’s lessor then purchased of Adam Funk, and obtained his deed for the land. It appears from the certificate of reservation, that the court, on the trial, charged the jury that the defendants had the legal title, unless notice of the fraud in the conveyance from the father to the son was carried home, by the proof, to the sheriff, before he sold the premises, and to the defendant’s ancestor before his purchase; and in the charge so given, the plaintiff’s counsel claim the court misdirected the jury.
    Douglas & Leonard, for the plaintiff.
    Robinson, for the defendant.
   Wood, J.

The instruction given the jury was at the request of 163] counsel, and with the view to raise the question, *wh ether, if notice of the fraud, between the Funks, was carried home to the sheriff and Adam Stewart before the sale and purchase, such notice would invalidate Stewart’s title. It is the opinion of the whole court, as it was the opinion of the judges before whom the trial was had on the circuit, that such notice, if carried home to both sheriff and purchaser, is of no consequence in its effect upon the title of Stewart. The charge, therefore, if erroneous, was in favor of the plaintiff, and he can not avail himself of any objection to it, so far as the question of notice is involved. It was urged, however, by the plaintiff’s counsel, and is again insisted, that the deed from the elder to the younger Funk, being made to defraud creditors, was void, and the title to the property never passed by it, bub remained in Adam Funk, until conveyed by his subsequent deed to the plaintiff’s lessor.

This position can not be sustained. A deed made to defraud creditors is only void as against creditors. Such was the construction given to the statute by this court, in Burgett v. Burgett, 1 Ohio, 469; and the plaintiff’s lessor stands before us as a purchaser and not as a creditor. Such fraudulent conveyances are valid as between the parties. As between them, the title passed to Absalom was bound by the judgment, and the sheriff’s sale and deed conveyed it to the ancestor of the defendants. Of this sale no one, it is clear to us, unless he be a bona fide creditor, has any right to complain, whether the sheriff and Adam Stewart had or had not notice of the fraudulent intent which existed between the Funks. The motion must be overruled and judgment entered on the verdict.

Motion overruled.