Case Name: John Alex THORNHILL, Appellant, v. Glen CHAPMAN, Appellee
Court: Mississippi Court of Appeals
Jurisdiction: Mississippi
Decision Date: 1999-07-20
Citations: 748 So. 2d 819
Docket Number: No. 97-CA-01476-COA
Parties: John Alex THORNHILL, Appellant, v. Glen CHAPMAN, Appellee.
Judges: KING, P.J., BRIDGES, DIAZ, LEE, PAYNE, AND THOMAS, JJ., CONCUR.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 748
Pages: 819–829

Head Matter:
John Alex THORNHILL, Appellant, v. Glen CHAPMAN, Appellee.
No. 97-CA-01476-COA.
Court of Appeals of Mississippi.
July 20, 1999.
George C. Williams, Quitman, Attorney for Appellant.
John E. Howell, Meridian, Attorney for Appellee.

Opinion:
IRVING, J.,
for the Court:
¶ 1. On February 20, 1991, a certificate of deposit was purchased at Citizen's National Bank in the names of John Alex Thornhill and Glen Chapman. Chapman filed a suit to partition the certificate. Thornhill contended that he provided the funds for the purchase of the certificate and that the certificate belonged to him. He sought to introduce parol evidence to prove his contention. The trial court disallowed the proof and ordered the certificate divided equally between the parties. On appeal Thornhill argues that the trial court erred in not allowing parol or extrinsic evidence to establish the real owner of the funds deposited. He also argues that the trial court erred in ordering the certificate divided equally between the parties.
FACTS
¶ 2. The facts, as established at the trial of this matter by the testimony of Mickey Boler, branch manager of Citizen's National Bank, are that appellant, John Alex Thornhill, and appellee, Glen Chapman, purchased a certificate of deposit from his bank on February 20, 1991. The purchase was in the names of both Glen Chapman and John Alex Thornhill. That very same day a safe deposit box was leased in the names of Glen Chapman or Alex Thornhill. Glen Chapman testified that he purchased the CD on February 20, 1991, and that he did so with a check drawn on his personal account. Each year he received IRS Form 1099 showing the interest earned on the certificate. He further testified that the CD was kept in the jointly leased safe deposit box and was removed by Thornhill on December 31, 1991, but its removal was not discovered by him until March 11, 1994. It was following this discovery that Glen Chapman filed suit for partition of the proceeds from the certificate.
¶ 3. On cross-examination of Chapman, Thornhill attempted to question Chapman about the source of the funds used to purchase the CD. Chapman objected, citing the parol evidence rule. The court sustained the objection, and evidence relative to the source of the money to purchase the CD was excluded.
STANDARD OF REVIEW
¶4. What we are presented with here is essentially a question of law. The manifest error/substantial evidence rules have no application to our appellate review of such questions. The principle of "manifest error" applies only to a factual situation. If the chancellor is manifestly wrong in basing his decision upon the facts, then this court will reverse; otherwise, we will affirm. This rule does not apply on questions of law. Cole v. National Life Insurance Co., 549 So.2d 1301, 1303 (Miss.1989) (citing Boggs v. Eaton, 379 So.2d 520, 522 (Miss.1980)); Mississippi State Highway Commission v. Dixie Contractors, Inc., 375 So.2d 1202, 1206 (Miss.1979); S & A Realty Co. v. Hilburn, 249 So.2d 379, 382 (Miss.1971). 'With regard to a pure question of law, this Court shall conduct a de novo review." Cole, 549 So.2d at 1303.
ISSUES
I. DID THE CHANCELLOR ERR IN FINDING THAT JOHN ALEX THORNHILL COULD NOT INTRODUCE PAROL OR EXTRINSIC EVIDENCE TO ESTABLISH THE REAL OWNER OF THE FUNDS DEPOSITED IN THE CERTIFICATE OF DEPOSIT?
¶ 5. The chancellor based her findings to exclude parol evidence matters on the authority of Estate of Bodman v. Bodman, 674 So.2d 1245 (Miss.1996) and Cooper v. Crabb, 587 So.2d 236 (Miss.1991). In so doing, she held that parol evidence should not be considered by the court to infer an intent contrary to that emanating from the document itself. In Cooper v. Crabb, the trial court allowed parol evidence to defeat a joint tenancy with right of survivorship created by a CD in the names of a testator and her caretaker. The Mississippi Supreme Court, in reversing the chancellor's ruling admitting parol evidence to defeat the joint tenancy stated:
We search for intent, but when we search for intent we accept that the law directs our search and points first and foremost to the text the parties created. Matter of Estate of Anderson, 541 So.2d 423, 428 (Miss.1989). Common sense suggests the parties' writings the most reliable evidence of their intent. Common law directs that, where we find survivorship clauses in the name of the account itself, Weaver v. Mason, 228 So.2d 591, 593 (Miss.1969), in the signature cards, Estate of Isaacson v. Isaacson, 508 So.2d 1131, 1134 (Miss.1987), or in a joint account agreement, Stewart v. Barksdale, 216 Miss. 760, 762, 63 So.2d 108, 109 (1953), we enforce them according to their tenor. The language to which Bethay and Cooper bound themselves, together with the bank, is without ambiguity. It declares the funds represented by the CDs held by them as joint tenants with rights of survivorship
And if there were any doubt, which there is not, the Legislature in 1988 has enacted a presumption in the case of deposits in the name of two or more persons payable, as here, to any one of such persons or the survivor.
Cooper, 587 So.2d at 240.
¶ 6. Appellant Thornhill argues that the two cases relied upon by the chancellor turned on questions of survivorship, which is not an issue in this case because both Chapman and Thornhill are still alive, and instead would have this court follow Delta Fertilizer, Inc. v. Weaver, 547 So.2d 800 (Miss.1989). Thornhill is correct in his contention that Bodman and Cooper involve a question of survivorship, and sur-vivorship is not an issue in the case sub judice. However, this fact, as will be discussed later, avails him naught. Further, -Thornhill's reliance on Delta is misplaced.
¶ 7. This is not a case involving a dispute between a survivor to a joint account and third parties as was the case in Cooper and Bodman, nor is this a case involving one of two living joint owners as was the case in Delta Fertilizer, Inc. What we have here is a dispute between two living joint owners of a certifícate of deposit concerning the ownership of the funds represented by that certifícate with one of the joint owners seeking to introduce parol evidence to contradict the express terms of the certificate. Cooper and Bodman are clear authority for the proposition that parol evidence may not be used to rebut the presumption of the creation of a right of survivorship in the surviving depositor or joint tenant. Delta Fertilizer, Inc. is a different matter and requires further discussion. In Delta Fertilizer, Inc., Delta Fertilizer, Inc. obtained a judgment against Jack Morgan Weaver d/b/a/ Newton Feeder Service. Delta Fertilizer, Inc. then garnished a bank checking account, a savings account and two certificates of deposit, all of which were held jointly in the name of Jack Morgan and other parties. One of the joint tenants, Mrs. Eleanor D. Weaver, mother of Jack Morgan Weaver filed a motion claiming to be the sole owner of all monies in the various accounts and certificates of deposits. Mrs. Weaver and Jack were the only parties to testify as the hearing on the motion, and both testified that all the funds in the accounts belonged solely to Mrs. Weaver. At the conclusion of the hearing the trial court held that Mrs. Weaver had met her burden of proof and clearly established that the funds that were within the accounts, although Jack's name and another's name were on them, belonged to her. The trial court then dismissed the writs of garnishment. On appeal, our Supreme Court, in affirming the trial court noted that:
There was no objection to any of this testimony- [the testimony of Jack and Mrs. Waver] as violative of the best evidence rule. M.R.E. 1002. There was no documentation as to the source of the funds deposited in these accounts.
Delta Fertilizer, Inc., 547 So.2d at 801.
¶ 8. Clearly Delta Fertilizer, Inc., is distinguishable not only because it involved a garnishment action between the non-debt- or of one of two surviving joint tenants and a judgment creditor of the other joint tenant, but also because no objection was made to the testimony concerning the ownership of the funds.
¶ 9. Thornhill also cites Drummonds v. Drummonds, 248 Miss. 25, 156 So.2d 819 (1968) for the proposition that parol evidence is admissible to resolve the issue of ownership to funds held in the name of joint owners when a controversy arises over the ownership, even when ownership is presumed to be equal. Drummonds is a divorce case which involved a dispute between the divorcing parties over monies in a joint account. First, there was no issue concerning a parol evidence based objection to the admissibility of the testimony offered concerning ownership of the funds, and secondly, in divorce cases, trial judges have an obligation to equitably divide the assets of the marital estate acquired during the course of the marriage. It is difficult to see how this could ever be done appropriately without allowing evidence from each spouse concerning assets claimed to be exclusively owned by one spouse beyond the pale of the marital estate. Hence, we do not find Drummonds of any value in resolving the issue before us.
¶ 10. Thornhill urges the adoption of the holdings of out-of-state cases, which we need not discuss because there is ample case law within our jurisdiction to resolve the issue which confronts us here. As stated earlier, there was a parol evidence based objection to testimony concerning the source of the funds which were used to purchase the certificate of deposit. The trial court, relying on Cooper and Bodman sustained the objection. Since Chapman had testified, as well as pled in his complaint, that he purchased the certificate of deposit with a check drawn on his account, perhaps the trial court should have allowed the cross-examination. However, we conclude that, while the testimony was perhaps within the bounds of permissible cross-examination in light of Chapman's direct testimony that he had purchased the certificate of deposit with funds drawn on his account, the exclusion of it, as will be shown later, provides no weapon to Thorn-hill for use in his assault upon the decision reached by the trial judge.
¶ 11. Black's Law Dictionary has this to say about the parol evidence rule:
This evidence rule seeks to preserve integrity of written agreements by refusing to permit contracting parties to attempt to alter import of their contract through use of contemporaneous oral declarations. Under this rule when the parties to a contract embody their agreement in writing and intend the writing to be the final expression of their agreement, the terms of the writing may not be varied or contradicted by evidence of any prior written or oral agreement in the absence of fraud, duress or mutual mistake.
¶ 12. As stated, the certificate of deposit is in the name of Glenn Chapman or Alex Thornhill and contains the following pertinent statement:
"We" means the financial institution. "You" means the depositor(s) named above [Glenn Chapman or Alex Thorn-hill]. We will pay the certificate to you when you present and deliver it to us properly endorsed (signed by you), on a maturity date. If more than one of you are named above, you will own this certificate as joint tenants with right of survivorship (and not as tenants in common). You may change this ownership by written instructions.
¶ 13. There is no evidence in this record of any fraud, duress, or mutual mistake, nor is there any evidence that Chapman and Thornhill ever gave any written instructions regarding a contrary ownership to that stated on the face of the certificate of deposit. The ownership stated on the face of the certificate is that of joint tenancy. It can hardly be reasonably argued that the certificate of deposit is not a written contract between the bank, Chapman and Thornhill. Thornhill contends he should have been allowed to introduce evidence which would contradict the ownership as stated on the face of the certificate, that is, that he possessed a several tenancy in the certificate instead of a joint tenancy with Chapman. This is clearly prohibited by the parol evidence rule which prohibits the admission of evidence which is offered for the purpose of contradicting the plain unambiguous terms of a writing, in this case, the certificate of deposit. When a written instrument is clear, definite, explicit, harmonious in all its provisions and free from ambiguity, a court in construing it will look solely to language used in the instrument itself and will give effect to all parts of it as written, and when a contract is clear and unambiguous on its face, its construction is a matter of law and not fact and must be construed and enforced as written. See Pfisterer v. Noble, 320 So.2d 383, 384 (Miss.1975) and Griffin v. Tall Timbers Development, Inc., 681 So.2d 546, 551 (Miss.1996). For the reasons cited we affirm the trial judge's denial of the parol evidence offered to contradict the plain, unambiguous terms of the certificate.
II. DID THE CHANCELLOR ERR IN FINDING THAT GLEN CHAPMAN AND JOHN ALEX THORN-HILL JOINTLY OWNED IN EQUAL SHARE THE CERTIFICATE?
¶ 14. The certificate of deposit, by its express terms, provides that it is owned by Chapman and Thornhill as joint tenants.
¶ 15. Black's Law Dictionary defines "joint tenancy" as:
• An estate in fee-simple, fee-tail, for life, for years, or at will, arising by purchase or grant to two or more persons. Joint tenants have one and the same interest, accruing by one and the same conveyance, commencing at one and the same time, and held by one and the- same undivided possession.... Type of ownership of real or personal property by two or more persons in which each owns an undivided interest in the whole and attached to which is the right of surviv-orship. Single estate in property owned by two or more persons under one instrument or act.
¶ 16. The right to partition jointly owned property is absolute with the exception of the limitation placed on homestead property. Cheeks v. Herrington, 523 So.2d 1033, 1035 (Miss.1988). Since we have determined that the certificate was jointly owned by Chapman and Thornhill, it follows that partition was proper. Since Thornhill contended that he was entitled to all of the proceeds from the certificate of deposit, it was his burden to prove that fact. After the objection to his evidence was sustained on the basis that the parol evidence prevented its admissibility, he offered the following proffer:
What we would show would be that Mr. Chapman has a life estate on a piece of property that was a life estate that was conveyed to him by John Alex Thornhill on October 19, 1988. That Mr. Chapman paid no consideration for the life estate.
On October 18, 1990, John Alex Thornhill and Glen Chapman executed a timber deed to Brady Brothers Timber Company and sold timber in the amount of $18,000.00. That this $18,000, together with $12,000.00 supplied by Mr. Thornhill was used to purchase the CD.
Mr. Chapman has no funds in the CD. That the interest that was paid to Mr. Chapman was, in turn, given to Alex Thornhill, and they had an agreement that that would be placed in a CD, and the interest would be paid to him as his income was lower than Mr. Thornhill's and there would be no taxes paid. That it was an agreement that this would be deposited in those accounts and that was their understanding.
That, on two occasions, one in a deposition given by Mr. Chapman, he stated that.he gave the money that was derived from this timber sale of $18,000.00 to Mr. Chapman, I mean, to Mr. Thornhill, and, also, in an interrogatory submitted in Glen Chapman vs. Twin States Land and Timber Company, and a deposition was also. taken of Glen Chapman vs. Twin States Land and Timber Company, Inc. in the Circuit Court of Clarke County, Mississippi, at 96-0098, that he gave this money received from the timber to Alex Thornhill.
That, in actuality, all the money in the CD belongs to Alex Thornhill and the agreement was that they would put it in there and it would draw interest. Interest, in turn, has been paid to Mr. Thorn-hill.
¶ 17. It is obvious that the proffered evidence was offered to contradict the express terms of the certificate Of deposit that the ownership was a joint tenancy because this evidence would show a several tenancy in Thornhill. This evidence, as we have already determined was inadmissible under the parol evidence rule. The trial judge, having no evidence before her, on the percentage of ownership held by Chapman and Thornhill in the joint certificate other than the testimony of Chapman that the certificate was purchased with funds from his account, held that each of them owned a fifty percent interest. It is note worthy that when Chapman offered into evidence a canceled check to back up his claim that he purchased the certificate of deposit with funds drawn on his account, counsel for Thornhill objected as follows: "I don't see where the relevancy is that what purchased it, Judge. I object to it." At that point counsel for Chapman responded: "Your Honor, I quite frankly agree that you can't go behind the original document for evidence rules and other things, but I feel like he probably will. But, if you will, we mark this for identification". The canceled check was then marked for identification but never admitted into evidence. It is difficult for this court to understand how on the one hand Thornhill argues that he should have been allowed to introduce parol evidence to show the source of the funds used to purchase the certificate of deposit, and on the other hand objects to Chapman doing the same thing for the same purpose. And in Chapman's case, he had a document which would be the best evidence of the source. In other words, it appears that Thornhill's evidence was objectionable not only on the basis of the parol evidence rule but also on the basis of the best evidence rule in light of Chapman's documentation. As previously stated, the trial court had no evidence before it as to the respective percentages of ownership in the jointly held certificate other than Chapman's testimony that he purchased it with funds drawn on his account. The trial judge divided the proceeds of the certificate equally between Chapman and Thornhill. Apparently, this was agreeable to Chapman, since he did not appeal from the trial court's ruling. Perhaps this was so because in actuality the percentage as determined by the trial court correctly reflected the respective ownership held by him and Thornhill. In any event, it appears that Chapman, not Thornhill, made a more persuasive claim to one hundred percent of the certificate. We affirm the decision of the chancellor on this issue.
¶ 18. THE JUDGMENT OF THE CHANCERY COURT OF CLARKE COUNTY IS AFFIRMED. ALL COSTS OF THIS APPEAL IS ASSESSED TO THE APPELLANT.
KING, P.J., BRIDGES, DIAZ, LEE, PAYNE, AND THOMAS, JJ., CONCUR.
SOUTHWICK, P.J., CONCURS WITH SEPARATE OPINION JOINED BY McMILLIN, C.J. MOORE, J., NOT PARTICIPATING.
. Although the opinion says "best evidence rule", it appears that the court may have meant parol evidence rule with respect to the testimony.