Case Name: HUNTER & DAVIS v. LEVAN AND WIFE
Court: Supreme Court of California
Jurisdiction: California
Decision Date: 1858
Citations: 11 Cal. 12
Docket Number: 
Parties: HUNTER & DAVIS v. LEVAN AND WIFE.
Judges: 
Reporter: California Reports
Volume: 11
Pages: 11–12

Head Matter:
HUNTER & DAVIS v. LEVAN AND WIFE.
Where an assignment of a note and mortgage has been made to plaintiffs to indemnify them as sureties on a bail bond for the assignor, and where suit is then pending on such bond, it is proper for them, as such assignees, to institute suit on the note and mortgage, and a decree of foreclosure in such case, with directions to pay the money into Court, to await the further decree of the Court, is proper, or at least there is no error in such a decree to the prejudice of the defendants.
Appeal from the District Court of the Eleventh Judicial District, County of El Dorado.
The facts sufficiently appear in the opinion of the Court.
Hall & Hume and Hewes for Appellants.
Sanderson & Newell for Respondents.

Opinion:
Baldwin, J., delivered the opinion of the Court
Terry C. J., and Field, J., concurring.
This suit was brought on a note and mortgage executed by defendants to one Howard, and assigned by him to the plaintiffs. The assignment was unconditional, and in the usual form of such instruments. The Court finds that this assignment was made to plaintiffs by Howard to indemnify them against injury on account of their suretyship for him on a bail bond—the proceedings on which are now pending in this Court. This proof of the purpose and character of this instrument seems to have been made by parol. The Court ordered a sale of the mortgaged property, with directions to pay the money into Court to await its further decree.
We do not see any error in this decree to the prejudice of the defendants. By this arrangement, to say the least of it, the plaintiffs were made the pledgees or bailees of Howard, in respect to this debt assigned, and were bound to take the proper care of the subject of the Court. They were not bound to suffer the debt to be barred, or the chances of the property going to waste, before collecting the debt or foreclosing the mortgage, as might be the case if proceedings were delayed until the question of their liability on the bond was settled.
It is not necessary to decide whether, as this assignment was in writing, it would be admissible for Howard, or those claiming under him, to show by parol that what imparted an absolute sale or transfer was really a sale only on condition.
There was no error in striking out the answer of the defendants, to their prejudice, as it merely set up the facts upon which we have already passed, and some others not affecting the merits.
Decree affirmed.