Court Opinion

ID: 9714769
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 05:45:09.543028+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:28.421773
License: Public Domain

DeBRULER, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. The stop payment provisions of this statute are aimed primarily at the situation, like the one in the case at bar, in which an average consumer makes and delivers a check to pay for a piece of merchandise, thereafter finds fault with the merchandise, and is motivated by the discovery to stop payment on the check. The item paid for is often, like the car here, a complex mechanical or electrical device, and beyond the ability of the average individual to fully understand. To construe the phrase "valid legal cause" to require a successfully prosecuted legal defense to a later suit on the check is to burden the average prudent person with hiring a lawyer and an expert and getting their opinions before stopping payment. I think this is a greater burden than required by the statute. In the context of the purpose of this statute and in the context of all of the words in the statute, the words "valid legal cause" mean no more than having knowledge of facts which would lead a person of reasonable caution to form in good faith the belief that the merchandise is defective, ie., a type of probable cause. This is the type of judgment which those at whom the statute is aimed can reasonably make.
KRAHULIK, J., concurs.