Case ID: serg-rawl_13/html/0318-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Per Curiam.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

[Chambersburg,
    October, 27, 1825.]
    RAYMOND against BAAR.
    IN ERROR.
    One receiving a counterfeit note from an innocent person in payment, and keeping' it by him six months, without notice, is guilty of gross negligence, and must sustain the loss.
    The case in the Court of Common Pleas of Huntingdon county, to which this writ of error issued, was indebitatus assumpsit, by Charles Raymond, the plaintiff below, and plaintiff in error, against John Baar, for goods sold and delivered, and on the common money counts, to which court the defendant appealed, from the decision of a justice of the peace.
    The plaintiff’s clerk, in March, 1S19, in the plaintiff’s absence from home, sold the defendant goods to the value of six dollars, and received in payment a ten dollar bank note, of the Farmers and Mechanics’ Bank of Pittsburg, at twenty per cent, discount, returning to the defendant the balance in money. Two weeks afterwards, the plaintiff returned home, and the note being shown to him by the clerk, pronounced it a counterfeit. He retained it, however, in his possession, till the fall of that year, at which time the cii'cumstance was first mentioned to the defendant, by an agent of the plaintiff, and the defendant declined taking it back. The note was proved'on the trial to be a counterfeit.
    The court below charged the jury, that, if the defendant had no knowledge that the note was counterfeit, the plaintiff was precluded from recovering, by his retaining the note for an unreasonable time, without demand on the defendant, and the jury found a verdict for the defendant. The plaintiff excepted to the charge of the court
    
      jBurnside, for the plaintiff,
    cited 1 Wilson’s Bac. Ab. 162. 3 Mass. Rep. 74. 2 Johns. 455. 6 Mass. Rep. 182.
    
      MMullin, contra,
    relied on 10 Wheat. 333. 17 Mass. 33. Chitt. on Bills, 261. 4 Johns. 377.
   Per Curiam.

This is a very plain case. The plaintiff was guilty of most unreasonable negligence. He kept the note six months, after he knew it to be counterfeit, without giving notice to the defendant. It was his duty to return it to the defendant, as soon as he discovered it to be counterfeit. There was no suggestion of fraud in the defendant, in passing the note to the plaintiff. He supposed it to be genuine. If it had been returned to him in any reasonable time, he might have had recourse to the person from whom he recived it. But in consequence of the plaintiff retaining it so long, he has lost all chance of redress; because, it would be extremely difficult, after the lapse of six months, to identify the note, or prove from whom it was received. No plausible reason has been, or can be given, in justification of the plaintiff’s conduct. It was what is termed in law, crassa negligenta, gross negligence, and he ought to suffer for it. The charge of the Court of Common Pleas was perfectly correct, and the judgment should be affirmed.

Judgment affirmed.