Court Opinion

ID: 9546557
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:32:03.837953+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:16:36.498804
License: Public Domain

CURTIS, J.
I dissent. As a preliminary point of discussion it is necessary to advert briefly to the presentation and disposition of this litigation in the trial court. The pleadings are in the usual short form appropriate to quiet title actions. The complaint alleges the plaintiff’s ownership of certain described real property and the defendant’s assertion of an interest therein adverse to the plaintiff. The defendant in her answer denies all the averments of the complaint except as to her adverse claim, which she admits, but she denies that such claim is without right; in this connection defendant alleges that she is the owner and rightfully in possession of the property and prays that title be quieted in her. The case was tried by the court sitting without a jury. Following the general form of the allegations contained in the parties’ respective pleadings, the trial court in its findings resolved the adverse claims of ownership in favor of the defendant and judgment was entered in accordance with that adjudication of the title to the property. Such determination rests upon the inefficacy of the deed of 1932 to sustain the plaintiff’s cause of action.
The following review of the record will demonstrate the propriety of the trial court’s decision: While the defendant *548admitted signing the deed in question, she consistently maintained that she had no intention of “passing the title” or giving away [her] home” or “passing any interest” to the plaintiff. It appears that the defendant knew the instrument was drafted in favor of her mother-in-law, but that because of her ill health the defendant did not read the document and relied solely on her husband’s statement that the transaction was “merely for convenience” and a reconveyance by his mother would immediately follow. Illustrative of the defendant’s understanding of the matter are these excerpts from her testimony: In answer to the question “What did your husband tell you” when the deed was executed, the defendant upon direct examination testified: “That he wanted me to sign this deed to his mother merely for a convenience; that very shortly it would be put back in my name, and the other paper I signed [at the same time] he told me that was the deed giving it back to us. I did not read either document due to my condition.” On cross-examination when queried as to the identity of the two documents she claimed to have signed contemporaneously the defendant stated: ‘ ‘ One he told me was giving the house to his mother and the other was his mother giving it back to me.” When asked as to what reason her husband gave her for negotiating the transfer, the defendant answered: “He said he was in some business difficulty and he didn’t want the home taken from his two children and his wife—he wanted to safeguard us.” Confirmatory of the defendant’s understanding of the affair is the fact that her possession and enjoyment of the property was in nowise disturbed as the result of this deed. At the trial the defendant’s husband, Lester H. Strong, admitted that he told the defendant when she signed the deed that such transfer was necessary because of financial difficulties.
Also of some pertinency in this connection is the evidence relating to the matter of consideration in support of the disputed conveyance. At the trial the plaintiff attempted to correlate the transaction here involved with her action some eight weeks later in deeding two pieces of real estate to her son, Lester H. Strong. Although the latter was called to testify on behalf of the plaintiff, he was not asked to corroborate his mother’s claim as to the issue of consideration. It appears that the defendant did not know of these later conveyances to her husband, and she, therefore, was unable to testify as to their purpose. However, she did state that at the time in question the plaintiff was financially interested *549in certain business ventures of Lester H. Strong and concerned with their successful outcome. On cross-examination the plaintiff admitted that she frequently gave her son money or property on which he might obtain loans to relieve pressing financial obligations. In view of the significant discrepancy between the respective dates of the mentioned deeds, the natural as well as business relationship between the plaintiff and Lester H. Strong, and the conflicting possibilities as to the object of the plaintiff’s transfer of realty to her son, the trial court, having the advantage of observing the demeanor of the parties on the witness-stand, apparently elected to discredit the plaintiff’s claim as to the existence of any connection between the successive conveyances and concluded that they were independent transactions, not intended as consideration one for the other. In accord with the settled rule that it is within the exclusive province of the trial court to pass upon the credibility of the witnesses and the weight of the evidence, the implied finding against the plaintiff on the issue of consideration would not be disturbed on appeal.
From this state of the record it can readily be inferred that the defendant was induced to sign the deed of 1932 solely by reason of the persuasion and misleading explanation of her husband as to the feigned nature of the transfer; that she never realized the full significance or import of the instrument, but that she had implicit trust in her husband’s management of their business affairs and accepted what he said without question; and that the confidence she reposed in him was betrayed in an attempt to consummate a conveyance of their community real property to her detriment. Thus, there was an absence of actual consent to the transfer on the part of the defendant, and under the prevailing circumstances the plaintiff is not in a position to urge the binding force of the defendant’s signature to the deed as an-unchallengeable manifestation of assent to the conveyance. While it does not appear that the plaintiff took part in the procurement of the deed, the equities of the ease support the defendant’s claim to relief upon the basis of her husband’s breach of his fiduciary duty to protect her interests and the want of consideration in support of the transfer. From this aspect the present situation is akin in principle to those cases wherein a gift, grant or bequest obtained by undue influence of a third person is vitiated thereby, and it is held immaterial that in the procurement *550thereof the immediate beneficiary did not participate. (Moore v. Moore, 81 Cal. 195 [22 P. 589, 874] ; see cases collected in 96 A.L.R. 613-615.)
The majority opinion holds that these evidentiary matters would have no bearing upon the determination of this appeal because the defendant did not plead the fraudulent character of the deed nor did the trial court make a finding based thereon. However, such omissions in the record do not militate against the propriety of the judgment nullifying the operative effect of the conveyance to the plaintiff in 1932. In a quiet title suit, unlike other actions generally, a defendant under a general denial may raise the issue that the plaintiff acquired title in whole or in part through a fraudulent transfer affecting her claim of title thereto. (12 Cal.Jur. §95, p. 1056; Howe v. Johnson, 107 Cal. 67 [40 P. 42]; Banning v. Marleau, 121 Cal. 240 [53 P. 692]; Bird v. Murphy, 72 Cal.App. 39 [236 P. 154]; Sellers v. Neil, 47 Cal.App.2d 128 [117 P.2d 390].) Nor after consideration of this point was the trial court required to make a special finding thereon. As previously stated, the complaint and answer are in the conventional style suitable to this type of litigation, and the findings are responsive to the general form of the pleadings. The issue as to the fraudulent nature of the conveyance arose merely in the evidence at the trial. Findings of fact are sufficient if they follow the language of the pleadings. (Dam v. Zink, 112 Cal. 91 [44 P. 331]; Vasey v. Campbell, 4 Cal.App. 451 [88 P. 509]; Biurrun v. Elizalde, 75 Cal.App. 44 [242 P. 109]; also, see cases collected in 24 Cal.Jur. §213, p. 984.) Ownership of the property by the defendant was the ultimate fact which was alleged in the answer and which was set forth in the findings. (Hitchcock v. Rooney, 171 Cal. 285 [152 P. 913]; Hannah v. Canty, 175 Cal. 763 [167 P. 373].) In reviewing the sufficiency of the findings to support a judgment, regard will be had to the ultimate facts and not to mere probative facts. (2 Cal.Jur. 872, and cases cited in Ten Year Supp.)
The majority opinion further holds that the defendant is not now in a position to question the validity of the deed to the plaintiff because the time limit of one year from the date of recordation of the instrument, the period specified in section 172a as available for the wife’s exercise of her right to avoid an unauthorized conveyance, had expired several years before the commencement of this quiet title action. However, *551this statement of the law has no application when the validity of the deed is questioned on the ground of fraud rather than non-compliance with the terms of section 172a. A statute of limitations is a special defense which may be either relied on or waived at the election of a party entitled to avail herself of it, and, if not specially made, it will be deemed to have been waived. (16 Cal.Jur. §232, p. 640; Estate of Garcelon, 104 Cal. 570 [38 P. 414, 43 Am.St.Rep. 134, 32 L.R.A. 595] ; Bliss v. Sneath, 119 Cal. 526 [51 P. 848].) Conceding that the general form of the pleadings in this action did not permit the plaintiff’s assertion of a time limitation by formal plea and that without such preliminary foundation she could have urged such bar in the trial court in avoidance of the defendant’s claim to relief, it does not appear from the record that the plaintiff did in fact present the point there. Consequently such matter should not be considered for the first time on appeal. (Estate of Garcelon, supra; Moore v. Copp, 119 Cal. 429 [51 P. 630]; Bliss v. Sneath, supra.) The rule governing such situation, where the formal plea of the statute of limitations is unnecessary in order to introduce evidence thereon at the trial, is stated in the case of Union Sugar Co. v. Hollister Estate Co., 3 Cal.2d 740, 745 [47 P.2d 273] : “However, it has been held that unless the adverse party invokes the plea of the statute at the trial, and brings to the attention of the trial court his purpose to offer evidence in support of such plea, the court cannot assume that he desires to make any such defense, and he cannot invoke the plea for the first time on appeal. [Citing authorities.] ”
Consistent with this review of the record herein, the defendant is entitled to relief from the operative effect of the disputed conveyance. In my opinion the judgment should be affirmed.
Shenk, J., and Carter, J., concurred.
Respondent’s petition for a rehearing was denied August 19, 1943. Shenk, J., Curtis, J., and Carter, J., voted for a rehearing.