Court Opinion

ID: 9826398
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 15:53:41.660587+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:42:02.898964
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Hydricic.
I concur in the opinion of Mr. Justice Fraser, except as to the disposition of points 3 and 5. As to 3: The testimony was susceptible of but one inference as to what receipt was referred to in the power of attorney. There is no evidence that defendant ever gave plaintiff any other receipt than that dated May 28, 1918; and that receipt is also sufficiently identified in the power of attorney as being the one therein referred to, because that instrument refers explicitly to the collection from Cosgrove *211of $450, a check for $350, and a note for $270, “all of which I then turned over to my attorney, John T. Duncan, taking his receipt for same.” The evidence is undisputed that there was only one collection from Cosgrove, and that it consisted of the very items mentioned in the power of attorney, and the receipt mentions “cash, check and note,” amounting to $1,070. The evidence being susceptible of but one inference, and that being that the receipt referred to in the power of attorney was the one dated May 28th, the Court erred in refusing to so instruct the jury, as requested by defendant, and that the rights of the parties were to be determined under the power of attorney.
As to 5 : The testimony was susceptible of but one inference as to the collection by defendant of plaintiff’s claim against the Cosgroves for $700, which defendant had undertaken to collect for a contingent fee of one-half the amount collected, and that inference is that neither the claim, nor any part of it, had ever been collected by defendant. Nevertheless, defendant charged half of that amount — $350—in his account against plaintiff, as an item for which he should have credit, on the ground that plaintiff had defeated his collection of it by making a settlement with the Cosgroves of all matters in dispute between them, without his knowledge or consent, after having employed him to collect it on the agreement that he should have half the amount collected.
Clearly, plaintiff had the right to settle with the Cosgroves and end the litigation between them, but, in doing so without the consent of defendant, he incurred liability to defendant, not necessarily for half the amount of the claim, as erroneously contended by defendant, but for reasonable compensation to defendant for the services which he had rendered in and about the investigation and prosecution of that claim. I agree, therefore, that the Court erred in excluding that claim entirely from the consideration of the jury. They should have been allowed to find what defendant had done, at the request of plaintiff, in and about the *212investigation and prosecution of that'claim, and what his services were reasonably worth, and for that amount he should have had credit. There was some evidence that that claim was fictitious and without foundation in fact or in law. If so, of course, defendant would not be entitled to anything on account of it.