Opinion ID: 1165768
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: appellants' petition for rehearing

Text: The third cause of action is in trover for a conversion of the so-called Hesketh truck and trailer which is also referred to in the testimony as the Rause truck and trailer and the freighter. On this cause of action the jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff in the amount of $7,000 general damages and $15,000 punitive damages. The verdict for punitive damages was subsequently set aside by the trial court and judgment for the plaintiff entered in the sum of $7,000. The ground of defendants' petition is that this Court's affirmance of the judgment was based upon a theory not pleaded in the complaint. After alleging that on, to-wit, September 1, 1959, plaintiff was the owner and entitled to the immediate possession of the vehicles in question, and that their reasonable market value in the county of Kootenai, Idaho, and in Yamhill county, Oregon, was $14,000, the complaint continued: IV. That on, to-wit: the 1st day of September, 1959 the defendants and each of them wrongfully and unlawfully took said vehicle from plaintiff and converted the same to defendants' own use without the consent of plaintiff; V. That prior to said wrongful taking the defendants induced plaintiff to give consent to defendants for them to take possession of said truck and trailer in the following manner: Defendants had previously been delivered a written assignment of plaintiff's interest in a land sale contract which plaintiff and his wife had entered into in February of 1959 with one James M. Davis and Lucille Davis, and which land sale contract pertained to land situated in a part of the Joseph Brisbine Donation Land Claim No. 51 in T2S, R3W of the Willamette Meridian; that said assignment has been made to defendants as additional collateral in security and in connection with a certain chattel mortgage transaction; that on or about the 18th day of September, 1959, defendants represented to plaintiff that if he should execute a power of attorney which would enable the defendants to obtain a transfer of title to the afore-described vehicles then upon delivery of said power of attorney to them by plaintiff, and upon defendants obtaining possession of said vehicles, defendants would reassign plaintiff all of their right, title and interest in the aforementioned real estate contract held by them as collateral; that plaintiff believed said representations to be true and was incarcerated in the Yamhill county jail at said time and was assured by defendants that unless such consent were given plaintiff would not be released from jail and other charges would be preferred against him; that plaintiff in reliance upon said representations and in fear of reprisals in fact executed and delivered a motor vehicle title transfer power of attorney to defendants which thus enabled them thereafter to take possession of said vehicles and to cause the titles to said vehicles to be registered in defendants' name; that at said time defendants did not intend to reassign said land sale contract to plaintiff but deceived plaintiff and coerced him and acted intentionally and maliciously; that defendants thereafter refused to reassign said land sale contract; VI. That by reason of the premises plaintiff alleges that the purported consent given defendants to take possession of the afore-described vehicles was a nullity and was fraudulently obtained;. We shall now refer to the evidence bearing upon the question. The case has its genesis in the purchase by the plaintiff Gowin from the defendant Baird of three log trucks and trailers and the execution by Gowin of a chattel mortgage on this equipment to secure the purchase price. As additional security, Gowin assigned to Baird his interest in a contract of sale of a farm. The mortgage was assigned by Baird to Heider for a valuable consideration. Later Gowin acquired the Hesketh truck and trailer, and transferred the motor from one of the mortgaged trucks to the Hesketh truck and departed for Idaho, leaving behind the mortgaged vehicles, but taking with him stakes, chains and binders and other equipment which Baird claimed to be his property. Baird swore to a criminal information charging Gowin with larceny by bailee of the motor above referred to and several other items of property. Gowin was apprehended in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, brought back to McMinnville, Oregon, and lodged in jail there on or about August 31, 1951, and so remained until September 18, 1959, on the charge preferred by Baird, and other charges. During this time Baird met with Gowin in the jail twice, on September 1 and September 18, 1959. On both occasions the sheriff of Yamhill county, Wallace Mekkers, was present. It is in evidence that before Gowin left for Idaho he removed the tires and wheels from the mortgaged vehicles and sold them to a concern in Portland referred to as Burns Brothers. Baird testified as an adverse witness for the plaintiff that Gowin told him that he would give me his equity in the Diamond T [the Hesketh truck] and trailer and farm and some fence posts and rolls of barbed wire still laying at the place, and some old peat buckets if I wouldn't push Burns Brothers for buying this property. That was our agreement in front of the Sheriff. As a witness in his own behalf Baird testified that he told Gowin that Burns Brothers admitted buying the tires, but that they had already sold them and that Gowin said that if I didn't press the charges on Burns that he'd give me the truck and trailer and everything else up there to get away from having another charge brought against him; that Gowin told him to go and get the property and gave him a letter to Mrs. Gowin (who remained behind in Coeur d'Alene after Gowin was arrested) authorizing her to turn over to him the Hesketh truck and trailer and various articles of equipment. Baird thereupon sent his agent, Aebi, to Coeur d'Alene with the letter, and Mrs. Gowin delivered the property to Aebi who brought it back to Oregon. He left the trailer with Peerless Trailer and Truck Service in Portland and drove the truck to Baird's garage in Sheridan. Baird testified that some $4,200 was owing on the purchase price of these vehicles and that he paid it off. Gowin's version of what took place at the first meeting was quite different from Baird's. In answer to a question by his counsel as to what conversation he had about the Hesketh truck and trailer, he answered: And they wanted their motor back in the truck and he says, `Stakes, chains and binders ' Mr. Baird was talking. He said they wanted their stakes, chains and binders also, and I told them they could have the stakes, chains and binders but not the truck  the motor had already been changed and the Sheriff says, `You better try to get along here. Try to cooperate in this matter.' Gowin's testimony continued: Q Why were you going to give them the stakes, chains and binders when they were yours? Would you explain that to the jury? A Well, I was under some pressure there, and I needed to get out of jail.      THE WITNESS: I needed to get out of the jail. I was under a good deal of pressure and I figured I could sacrifice some and retain the rest, but, then, in the conversation  the exact words I wouldn't recall  still on the same subject there though, of the stakes, chains and binders, and Mr. Baird made out the lists. As I called off by memory what parts was  including my parts; my fuel oil and so forth  grease  and he says, `I'll need a letter of signature, and I said, `No.' and the Sheriff says, `Never mind, it's going to be picked up by warrant anyway.' Although Gowin testified that I told them they could have the stakes, chains and binders but not the truck, nevertheless, it is shown without contradiction that he did sign the letter authorizing his wife to deliver the Hesketh truck and trailer to Baird. At another point in his testimony, with reference to the September first meeting, Gowin testified: I told him if he wanted the stuff back he could have it, but he'd have to go get it. He said, `Don't worry about that, I have the truck repossessed in Idaho.' He explained that by the stuff he meant the stakes, chains and binders. Regarding the meeting between Baird and Gowin on September eighteenth, the latter testified that Baird said: `We have the truck. The truck has been back since around the 4th ' somewhere in there  in that neighborhood, and that he had possession and that I still was under the impression that it had been picked up on a warrant, and, due to the release of the plates  a promissory release of the plates to get out  the Sheriff was putting a little pressure here and there. He further testified that on that occasion Baird induced him, by a fraudulent promise, to sign blank powers of attorney covering the mortgaged vehicles and the Hesketh truck and trailer so that Baird would be able to have the titles to these vehicles transferred into his name. The promise was that if Gowin would sign the powers of attorney Baird would reassign to him the contract of sale of Gowin's farm. Baird denied this testimony, but, as counsel for the defendants freely admits, the issue of fraud was for the jury. On this evidence we held as follows: It is our opinion that the conversion, if there was one, occurred when Baird's agent took possession of the Hesketh truck and trailer. As we have indicated in the part of this opinion dealing with the cause of action for malicious prosecution, there was evidence sufficient to go to the jury on the question whether Gowin's consent to Baird taking the property in Idaho was the product of duress. If so, the defendants' subsequent alleged fraud in obtaining the powers of attorney from Gowin on September eighteenth becomes relatively unimportant to the issues involved in this cause of action.    386 P2d at 18. 33-35. While we are still of the opinion that the evidence is sufficient to support a finding that Baird secured the letter of authority from Gowin and the possession of the vehicles by duress we are, nevertheless, convinced, after reargument and re-examination of the question, that the judgment cannot be sustained on that basis, for that is not the wrongful act alleged in the complaint. The complaint alleges a conversion that occurred at a later date and by other means, namely, the fraudulent promise to reassign the land sale contract to Gowin, coupled with a charge of duress, by all of which Gowin was induced to sign the power of attorney. We attach no importance to the date as such, as, generally speaking, the date is not so material but that a conversion may be proved to have been on a different date than that alleged. Aldrich v. Higgins, 77 Conn 370, 59 A 498. Here, the complaint alleged two dates, September 1 and September 18, but the plaintiff chose to state the circumstances of the conversion, and the means by which it was accomplished, on September 18. He could not recover by proof of a conversion at an earlier date accomplished by entirely different means. The complaint alleges that  prior to said wrongful taking  the plaintiff was induced by the false promise to execute a power of attorney which would enable the defendants to obtain a transfer of title to the vehicles, and that the promise would be carried out upon delivery of said power of attorney to defendants and upon defendants obtaining possession of said vehicles, and that the plaintiff, relying upon the promise and in fear of reprisals, executed a motor vehicle title transfer power of attorney to defendants, which thus enabled them thereafter to take possession of said vehicles and to cause the titles to said vehicles to be registered in defendants' name. The evidence is that more than two weeks before this Baird had gotten possession of the vehicles, not through the false promise and duress alleged in the complaint, but by securing Gowin's signature to a letter of authority addressed to Mrs. Gowin. The evidence that this letter and possession of the truck and trailer through it were obtained by duress is what caused us to hold in our former opinion that it was at that time, if at all, that the conversion took place. As an answer to this position counsel for the plaintiff on the oral argument on rehearing urged the following: Aebi was a dual agent. He was agent for Baird to bring back the stakes, chains, and binders and for Gowin to bring back the truck. The conversion was accomplished through a series of steps, and conversion of a motor vehicle is not complete until the wrongdoer obtains a certificate of title so that the title may be transferred through the State Department of Motor Vehicles. The first step was the obtaining by Aebi for Gowin of custody of the truck. At that time Baird had no intention of keeping the truck and the conversion was completed when the power of attorney was fraudulently obtained. Counsel stated that the letter was given voluntarily, but the truck was not given to the defendants at that point. The argument is a complete about-face on the part of counsel for the plaintiff, who contended in his brief on the original submission that the defendants extorted the letter from Gowin to Mrs. Gowin by telling him he would stay in jail until they `got the stuff back', and that the conversion was completed when Aebi obtained possession of the vehicles in Idaho and brought them back to Oregon. More importantly, there is no room in the evidence for the claim that in doing so Aebi acted as agent for Gowin. The sole question was whether Gowin gave the letter freely and voluntarily or as the result of duress. If it was the latter, there was a conversion. As previously stated, this was not the conversion pleaded by the plaintiff. Neither was it the issue submitted to the jury in the court's instructions, which dealt only with the defendants' alleged fraud and duress in obtaining the power of attorney on September eighteenth. Nevertheless, we think that the evidence justified the instructions and supports the judgment. There was no evidence that, as the plaintiff alleged, the power of attorney obtained by the defendants through the asserted fraud enabled them to take possession of the vehicles or to secure registration of them in their own names, but that does not end the inquiry. The question is, does the conduct of the defendants alleged and proven constitute such an exercise of dominion over the property, in exclusion of the plaintiff's right, as to amount to a conversion. 36. It is not necessary to a conversion that there should be a manual taking of the chattel by the defendant, or that it should be shown that he has applied it to his own use; a withholding of possession under a claim of title inconsistent with the title of the owner is sufficient, 2 Cooley on Torts (4th ed) 499-500, § 331; 89 CJS 533-534, Trover and Conversion, § 3. Dean Prosser says that a mere assertion of ownership, without any disturbance of possession, or any other interference with the right to it, is not sufficiently serious to be classed as a conversion, but [a] claim of title by one who is in possession, which reasonably implies that the owner will not be permitted to obtain the goods, will be enough. Prosser on Torts (2d ed) 77. Supporting the text are Baker v. Beers, 64 NH 102, 6 A 35; Adams v. Mizell, 11 Ga 106; Oakley v. Lyster, 1 KB 148 (1931). In the case last cited, the defendant had not even taken possession of the property, described as hard core and tar macadam, which belonged to the plaintiff and had been deposited by him on land which he rented for that purpose. The land was later purchased by the defendant who never went into possession. Nevertheless, a letter written by the defendant's solicitor to the plaintiff warning the latter that if he attempted to remove the stuff he would become a trespasser was found by the court to be sufficient evidence of a conversion. 37. We have no difficulty in holding that one who, for the purpose of getting the title to a motor vehicle registered in his own name, obtains from the true owner by fraud or duress a power of attorney which would enable him to accomplish that purpose, is guilty of an unlawful interference with the true owner's dominion over the property, where, as here, the wrongdoer is in possession of the property. That the power of attorney proved to be insufficient for its intended purpose, as the evidence indicates, is not material. Neither is it material that the possession of the defendants was unlawful. See 89 CJS 547, Trover and Conversion § 37, where it is said: Regardless of whether he came into possession of the property lawfully or unlawfully, a person in possession of the personal property of another is guilty of conversion where he makes an unfounded claim or assertion of ownership or title thereto, or treats or deals with the property as owner.    Thus, the evidence was sufficient to show a distinct act of dominion wrongfully exerted by the defendants over plaintiff's property on September eighteenth, and a conversion, as alleged in the complaint. In the circumstances of this case, the plaintiff had his election to make either the original conversion or the later one the basis of an action in trover. In the particulars hereinabove indicated, our former opinion is modified, but the decision affirming the judgment on the third cause of action is adhered to.