Court Opinion

ID: 9865170
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 16:25:56.046391+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:37:46.152594
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Hilliard,
dissenting.
I am of opinion the judgment should be reversed. It appears that the plaintiff, claiming to be the owner of certain chattels in the possession of the defendant, and similar in kind to other chattels in his possession, commenced this action in conversion. The court found for the plaintiff, awarded damages and entered judgment; and the defendant prosecuted this writ, the substance of his assignments of error being that the evidence fails to establish conversion.
It further appears that prior to 1925, and thereafter for a period, a Mrs. Schultz, sister of the plaintiff, was the owner of an apartment building in Denver. It was mortgaged to a Denver bank for some $24,000. During 1925, the defendant loaned $8,000 to Mrs. Schultz, taking a second mortgage. The furnishings of the apartment, belonging to Mrs. Schultz, were mortgaged to one Swed-low. The bank foreclosed its mortgage, the defendant redeemed therefrom, and subsequently became the owner of the realty. Mrs. Schultz had also, before the bank foreclosure, become in default under the Swedlow mortgage and the defendant loaned her money to take it up besides an additional sum, to secure which he took a chattel mortgage in his favor on the furnishings.
“When the defendant became the owner of the premises he demanded possession thereof, which was refused, as was also his demand for possession of the chattels, based on default in payment of his mortgage thereon. He brought an action of unlawful detainer to obtain possession of the real estate, and the code action for possession, commonly styled replevin, of the chattels. The latter action was never tried; the former was decided in *366his favor, and Mrs. Schultz was dispossessed by the sheriff. As a result of this ouster the defendant came into possession of both'the real estate and the mortgaged chattels. Some time thereafter the plaintiff asserted that among the chattels so taken were some belonging to her and not included in the mortgage, and out of her efforts to obtain them this action arose.
There is no actual conflict of testimony as to what occurred. Incidental to acquiring possession of the real estate, done by orderly process of law, the defendant unwittingly became possessed of goods claimed by the plaintiff. When' the plaintiff asserted ownership of the goods he disclaimed any interest in, title to, or desire to exercise dominion over them. In this situation the plaintiff, through an agent, demanded that the defendant assume the responsibility of segregating and delivering to her the property involved, while the defendant insisted that the plaintiff' should identify her goods—there was difficulty, it seems, of identification by either party—and remove them. No effort was made b3r the plaintiff to point out or identif3'- the goods she claimed until after June 15, 1926, the day on which she commenced her action. This is borne out b3¡r the testimony of counsel for the plaintiff which relates to conversations between counsel and the late Daniel L. Webb, then attorney for the defendant, and was elicited under cross-examination.
“Q. Isn’t it a fact that there had been no definite refusal, or no refusal at all, prior to the time that this suit was broug’ht by Mr. Lutz or Mr. WTebb to give up that furniture if she could tell anybody which was hers? A. Well, I always thought that the shoe was on the other foot; I thought that it was up to him, if he had taken this furniture it was up to him to set it out, it was not up to her to go to his place after she had been thrown out and make any further demands. He had taken possession of it and was holding it and using it, and it was his business to set it out if it was not his and he never did anything; just said if it was hers, let her come and get it.
*367“We tried a great many times to get Mr. Lutz to come up there to the house. I have no recollection of his ever having been in my office. I remember being in his office a number of times. I met him at the apartment house once and told him it was impossible for me to identify the stuff unless it was in the apartment house where it was listed, and we tried repeatedly to get Mrs. Schultz and Mrs. Becker and him together, and they would be there and would telephone for him and he would be off somewhere else, and we never got him there.
“Q. Did you ever bring Mrs. Becker up there in an effort for her to decide which was hers? A. Yes, I cannot remember the date. It was all after the suit was brought, it was a long time after the suit was brought.
“Q. You failed to bring her up there after the demands and before the suit was brought, in an effort to have her point out what belonged to her, did you? A. I don’t think that was ever done. I think it was after the suit was brought.
“ Q. You would not bring her up there before? A. I would have met her any time; they were just clamoring for this stuff all the time and pounding* me on the back all the time to do something, but I could not get anywhere.
“I don’t think that we went up there before June 15th, 1926, to point out what was hers.
“Q. Did you see these apartments that are listed in this complaint? A. My recollection is that we went into one or two of them, and we found that things that were there did not answer the description in the least.
“I cannot tell when we went up there. It was a long time after suit was brought. I think we went into three apartments, and found what appeared to be the brass bed that was listed down in the basement. We did not go far until we saw that the stuff that wras in the apartments that we were in was not the stuff that wras listed ¡on that list at all, and I had no way of telling what anything was if it was not in the apartment where it was listed. I am *368not sure that we even went into the basement. I think we went into the storeroom. I haven’t a very distinct-recollection as .to what we saw there.
“I went far enough to satisfy myself and Mr. Lutz that it was impossible for us to get out and brand anything up there without having somebody that knew the animal when they looked it in the face.
“Q. It was just as impossible for him as it was for you, wasn’t it? A. Well, he said so, that is all I know.”
Such being the facts, I am of opinion that the defendant was not guilty of conversion. Conversion, as was held in Pennsylvania Fire Insurance Co. v. Levy, 85 Colo. 565, 569, 277 Pac. 779, 780, is “any distinct, unauthorized act of dominion * * * exercised by one person over personal property belonging to another.” Judge Cooley (Torts, 3d Ed., p. 859) says it is “any distinct act of dominion wrongfully exerted over one’s property in denial of Ms right, or inconsistent with it, * * *” but (p. 861), “The act must * * * be intended, and not merely accidental or negligent.” In Lininger Implement Co. v. Foundry Co., 73 Colo. 412, 416, 216 Pac. 527, 529, it was said, “Not every act of interference with the owner’s right to personal property is a conversion; ” and in SigelCampion Co. v. Holly, 44 Colo. 580, 589, 101 Pac. 68, 72, it was decided, in considering’ the result of exercising dominion over another’s chattels, that “if this, exercise is not inconsistent with plaintiff’s right or title * * * there is no conversion.”
Butler v. Jones, 80 Ala. 436, 2 So. 300, is a case of similar facts and seems persuasive on the point here involved. There one Howard had borrowed office furniture and was using it at the time of his death. His landlord, to whom he was indebted for rent, was in possession of the furMture and when an agent of the owner demanded it the landlord inquired if the agent knew and could point out the things belonging to his principal. The reply was negative and the landlord said? “Let Mr. Jones, or someone who knows the things, come and get *369them,” and asserted he would hold whatever belonged to Howard for the rent. Jones, in this state of facts, brought trover, but the Alabama court held that the refusal was not absolute, but qualified and conditional, and, under the circumstances, reasonable and justifiable, citing Green v. Dunn, 3 Campbell 316. In that case the defendant, on taking possession of premises he had leased, found timber left there by a former tenant. The tenant demanded the timber and the defendant replied: “If you will bring anyone to prove that it is your property I will give it you, and not else.” And this was held to be a reasonable and qualified refusal, and not to constitute conversion.
The judgment of the trial court was based—entirely, I believe—on the rule pronounced in Meek v. Smith, 59 Colo. 461, 149 Pac. 627. There a mob took forcible possession of Smith’s printing plant and drove her out of town. The defendants, members of the mob, subsequently offered to return the goods, but this was held to be of no effect for clearly the conversion was complete when the forcible possession was taken. The learned trial judge who heard the case at bar must have misapprehended the rule of the Meek case, for it seems plain to me it has no- application to- the facts here.
The other cases depended upon by counsel for plaintiff likewise rest upon different facts; in them either the taking was wrongful or the subsequent claims were of ownership and amounted to wrongful dominion. Here, I think, the contrary appears; the possession was innocent and the subsequent retention justifiable.