St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1889-06-07
HOW's TINS SMILE?
Heavy Suits Instituted Against
Him for Alleged Breach of
Trust.

Heavy Suits Instituted Against
Him for Alleged Breach of
Trust.
There was case on trial yesterday in
the district court in which Tim"
ByrneS, the well-known politician,
figures conspicuouSly as defendant.
The case is but one of several that have
been instituted on similar grounds.
This action, on trial before,J Judge Rea,
is brought by Patrick Walsh as
receiver of the property of William A.
Rodgers A few years ago Rodgers was
engaged in the logging business and
was well-to-do. Besides owning large
tract of pine land in Altkln county he
owned the site and the three-story
brick block on First avenue north, in
which is located the Minnesota Pack
ing company. Mr.. ByrneS was his
lawyer. The claim of the plaintiff is
that Rodgers, being threatened with
insolvency. to save this property decided
ceiving no compensation whatever. but
that there was pretended cOmpensa-
ton of $4,000 for the pine land prop
erty, $4,000 for the Minneapolis block,
$500 for furniture in this building,
and 1000 for logging outfit. AS these
estimates are very small, it is thought
the property transferred altogether
amounts to considerably over 100000.
This property Mr.. Byrnes decided to his
wife, and it was afterwards decided
to her mother and father. Mr..
and Mrs. George W. Goodrich.
Among the creditors of Rodgers was
NJ. I. Salisbury, who claimed $1,000 and
received a judgment against him year
ago for 81, 419.47. The action is brought
in his behalf, and the demand made is
that all of the transfers before spoken
of from Rodgers to Goodrich be de-
clared null and void. Rodgers was on
the stand good part of the afternoon.
His story is something as follows: He
had a good many creditors who he was
made to believe were going to come
down on him. He had lot of logs in
the woods at the time. If he could hold
them off till these were marketed
he could save his property, so he decided
all of the property to Byrnes. with the
understanding that after the difficulty
was passed it was to be decided back to
him. and that no compensation was
made to him for it. In deciding the
First avenue property, mortgage for
$4,000 was made on it to c. E. Cum
mings, real estate man Of the city.
After while he and Byrnes had some
difficulty over the rent which Byrnes
was collecting from this property and
keeping. Byrnes then set up claim
to the property as his own,
and holding the deed, transferred
it to his wife, and Rodgers
was left out. These are the claims IN
this case, and it will be on trial to-day,
with probably some interesting devel-
opments and deal of contention.
There was another case that was eX
pected to have come up before Judge
Smith yesterday, in which Jonas F.
Brown, another creditor of Rodgers. is
the plaintiff and Byrnes the principal
defendant. In this case Brown, as a
creditor, paid $4,000 to keep Cum
mings' mortgage from being foreclosed,
and brings the action to gain a
clear title to the property as against
Byrnes' and Rodgers adverse claims.
As to this, Rodgers claims that he eX-
pected Byrnes to pay the mortgage of
$4,000. and went to see him about it,
but that he never took any action in the
matter. The theory is that Byrnes ar
ranged with Cummings to let the mort
gage be foreclosed, when the property,
going entirely out of Rodgers posses
sion, might be divided. Brown, how
ever, spoiled this by coming in and
paying down $4,000 in good cool cash
at the last moment on the day before
the foreclosure was to be made.