Title: Ziffrin Truck Lines, Inc. v. Ziffrin

State: indiana

Issuer: Indiana Supreme Court

Document:

242 Ind. 544 (1962)
180 N.E.2d 370
ZIFFRIN TRUCK LINES, INC., ET AL.
v.
ZIFFRIN ET AL.
No. 29,991.

Supreme Court of Indiana.
Filed February 26, 1962.
R. Stanley Lawton, Alan H. Lobley, and Ross, McCord, Ice & Miller, of counsel, all of Indianapolis, for appellants.
Murray E. Dulberger, John P. Price, Robert Hollowell, Barnes, Hickam, Pantzer & Boyd, and Hollowell & Hamill, of counsel, all of Indianapolis, for appellees.
JACKSON, J.
This is an appeal from an interlocutory order of the trial court appointing a temporary receiver for the appellant, Ziffrin Truck Lines, Inc.
Appellants' Assignment of Errors contains six specifications as follows:
In order that we obtain a clear procedural and factual background of the events leading to this appeal, it is necessary that we briefly review some of the events occurring prior to the appointment of the temporary receiver. The original action was instituted in the Marion Superior Court by Louis Ziffrin, v. Ziffrin Truck Lines, Inc., Simon Ziffrin, Herman Liberman, Louis Levy, John Barney, Betty Marcus and David Ziffrin as cause No. S60-3606 entitled the "Stockholder's Derivative Action Complaint and Request for Appointment of a Receiver" and consisted of thirty-four rhetorical paragraphs. In essence the plaintiff's complaint may be reduced to the following propositions:
The defendants below, appellants here, answer the allegations of the complaint in substance on the following grounds:
The record in this case is so voluminous that it would be impractical to attempt to here compile a snyopsis thereof without unduly encumbering the record to no advantage to either the litigants or to this court.
A careful review of all the evidence in this case, in the opinion of the writer, fails to disclose either that an emergency existed for the appointment of a receiver pendente lite or that plaintiff did not have an adequate remedy at law.
In view of the fact that the main action is yet to be disposed of in the trial court, we have purposely *547 narrowed consideration of the issues involved in this appeal in order that we not invade the province of the trial court.
It is, we think, axiomatic that a receiver should not be appointed if the plaintiff has an adequate remedy at law or by way of temporary injunction. This rule was expressed by this court in Fagan etc. et al. v. Clark et al. (1958), 238 Ind. 22, 148 N.E.2d 407, where the court said at page 26, "[r]elief by receivership is an extraordinary remedy and is never exercised if there is an adequate remedy at law or the harm can be prevented by injunction or restraining order." See also: Ziffrin v. Ziffrin (1962), 242 Ind. 351, 179 N.E.2d 276; State ex rel. Makar v. St. Joseph County Cir. Ct. (1962), 242 Ind. 339, 179 N.E.2d 285.
In Gluck and Becker, Receivers of Corporations, (1896) (2d Ed.), § 22, it is stated:
In 1 Clark on Receivers (1959), (3rd Ed.), § 59, pp. 67, 68, it is stated:
The judgment of the trial court appointing a receiver for Ziffrin Truck Lines, Inc. is therefore reversed, and said cause remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
Achor, C.J., Bobbitt and Landis, JJ., concur.
Arterburn, J., concurs in result.
NOTE.  Reported in 180 N.E.2d 370.