Opinion ID: 104910
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: rights of the judgment creditors under new york law.

Text: In the New York courts, petitioners invoked one of several provisional remedies which, from time out of mind, New York has extended to its citizens against their nonresident debtors. These, in appropriate circumstances, may take the form of receivership [10] or attachment. [11] While these two remedies differ in nature and incidents, they are alike in being available at the commencement or during the pendency of an action, are not independent but auxiliary in character, and are not designed finally to adjudge substantive rights but to secure such judgment as may be rendered. As employed in this case, attachment also was the sole basis of jurisdiction. The attachment levy on bank balances is perfected by service of a certified copy of the warrant of attachment on the banking institution, [12] which is required to certify to the sheriff making the levy the balance due to the defendant. [13] The levy does not require the sheriff to take physical possession of any property, nor does it require any transfer of title. The effect is prescribed: Any such person so served with a certified copy of a warrant of attachment is forbidden to make or suffer, any transfer or other disposition of, or interfere with, any such property or interest therein so levied upon, . . . or sell, assign or transfer any right so levied upon, to any person, or persons, other than the sheriff serving the said warrant until ninety days from the date of such service, except upon direction of the sheriff or pursuant to an order of the court. [14] The account attached must, on the sheriff's demand, be paid over to him within ninety days, unless, as here, the time has been extended by order of court, and the sheriff is authorized to institute an action within that time to recover amounts withheld. [15] These creditors prosecuted their actions to judgments which could be satisfied only from attached property and by issuance of executions. [16] An attachment merges in an execution when issued, but it is not annulled until the judgment is paid and remains in force to keep alive the lien on the property. Castriotis v. Guaranty Trust Co., 229 N. Y. 74, 79, 127 N. E. 900, 902 (1920). Execution, if issued, would require a transfer of credit and of funds, but this step has not been taken and, it is admitted, cannot be taken in these cases without a federal license. While requirement of a federal license creates something of a contingency as to satisfaction of the judgments, as matter of New York law this does not deprive the judgment of its validity or the attachment of its lien. Commission for Polish Relief v. Banca Nationala a Rumaniei, 288 N. Y. 332, 338, 43 N. E. 2d 345, 347 (1942). Although the provisional remedy of attachment, as used in this case, has served to provide the basis of jurisdiction and has created a lien to secure satisfaction of the judgment, it is clear that it has neither attempted nor accomplished any transfer of possession, for these attachments have been maintained for over nine years, and the accounts are still where they were before the attachments were levied. That there has been no transfer of title to the funds by the proceedings to date also is clear. If the judgment debtors chose to satisfy the judgments by other means, or to substitute an undertaking for the property attached, they could do so, and the accounts would be freed of the lien. [17] Under state law, the position of these judgment creditors is that they have judgments, secured by attachments on balances owned by German aliens, good as against the debtors, but subject to federal licensing before they can be satisfied by transfer of title or possession. The Custodian claims, in a collateral attack, that federal courts should pronounce them wholly void and of no effect.