Allen v. Shaver

289 P.2d 255, 136 Cal. App. 2d 621, 1955 Cal. App. LEXIS 1527
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedOctober 31, 1955
DocketCiv. No. 20714
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 289 P.2d 255 (Allen v. Shaver) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering California Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Allen v. Shaver, 289 P.2d 255, 136 Cal. App. 2d 621, 1955 Cal. App. LEXIS 1527 (Cal. Ct. App. 1955).

Opinion

WHITE, P. J.

Primarily, this is an appeal by plaintiff executrix from a judgment of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County in an action by her to enforce an accounting by the surviving partner of her deceased husband. The other parties and other purposes of the action will not be discussed [622]*622or considered except in connection with issues to which they are pertinent.

Respondent George W. Shaver is the surviving partner of Clarence Sibert, deceased, and will hereafter be referred to as “respondent.” He has adopted as his statement of facts and “first answer to appellant’s brief” a detailed opinion filed by the trial court and set forth in respondent’s appendix to his brief.

The facts, as stated by the trial court, occupy 11 pages of the printed appendix to respondent’s brief. Few references to the record are given in support thereof. The court’s findings occupy six pages of the clerk’s transcript and contain many long lists of numbers referring to paragraphs of pleadings found true or untrue. Respondent says in his brief that appellant’s “statement of facts must be ignored as not correct.” Bach party has called the court’s attention to the failure of the other to comply with certain rules on appeal and urged that therefore the brief of the other should be disregarded. From the reading and consideration of the clerk’s and reporter’s transcripts, 380 pages of briefs, and numerous, varied and lengthy exhibits, including files and reporter’s transcripts in prior actions, we realize that it is a difficult case to state, either clearly or briefly, and we are convinced that both appellant and respondent have made honest attempts to present the matters which they believe should be considered by this court. Consequently, we will not here discuss infractions of the rules on appeal by either party, but will proceed to consider the appeal upon its merits.

Clarence Sibert (hereinafter referred to as “Clarence”) died intestate October 8, 1937, leaving his widow Rena, who was then recovering from a nervous breakdown, and their daughter Mary Jane, then a minor. Respondent is the husband of Clarence’s sister and the two families were intimate friends.

In 1935, Clarence was employed as a jewelry manufacturer and respondent was employed as a salesman of market and restaurant equipment. Respondent told Clarence there was a need for a shoestring potato cutter and both, as partners, began working evenings, weekends and other spare time to devise one. Many models were made, tested, bent or broken and abandoned. Designs were repeatedly changed and improved, and new models made and tested. June 10, 1936, their application for letters patent was filed and manufacture and sale of the cutters was begun. In September, 1936, the [623]*623patent claims were rejected as lacking in novelty, all claims being covered by prior expired patents. The application was subject to amendment. In November, 1936, the partnership business was moved to larger quarters but continued to be a spare time project. Prior to December 1, 1936, more than 60 cutters had been sold at $35 each. February 8, 1937, as partners, respondent and Clarence filed with the county clerk a certificate that they were doing business under the fictitious firm name of S & S Specialty Company. June 14, ,1938, a patent was issued in the joint names of Clarence and respondent, on a single combination claim, described in the amendment filed after Clarence’s death but based upon a model devised with his assistance.

On August 1, 1938, respondent filed with the State Board of Equalization a statement and secured from them a certificate that he individually was doing business under the name of S & S Specialty Company; that the old S & S Specialty Company, which formerly consisted of George W. Shaver and Clarence E. Sibert, ceased as of the day before.

On or about August 25, 1952, after the judgment next cited had become final, citation under section 571 of the Probate Code required respondent, as surviving partner, to render an account. He caused notice of dissolution of the partnership to be filed with the county clerk, ceased business under the name of “S & S Specialty Company” and published notice that the patent would be sold on September 25, 1952.

On the same day, August 25, 1952, Shaver Specialty Company began doing business at the same location, with the same stock and equipment, the same employees, the same product, and the same customers.

In the instant action, the testimony of respondent’s expert witnesses placed the value of the patent at $97.20, $157.20, $300 and $500, and the court found the value of the pending application at the time of Clarence’s death to be $97.20. January 24, 1948, respondent alone applied for a new combination patent. According to respondent’s own testimony, at least 10,000 cutters had been sold at from $17.50 to $35 each prior to that date. From 1936 to 1948, the handle of each cutter bore the imprints “Keen Kut Shoestringer” and either “Pat. Pend.” or the number of the patent issued to Clarence and respondent. From 1948 to the time of the trial of the instant action, each handle bore the imprints “Keen Kut Shoestringer” and the number of respondent’s new patent.

[624]*624We deem it unnecessary to detail the facts constituting the claimed fraud on the part of respondent in obtaining from Rena and Mary Jane a purported assignment to him for the reason that rescission of the assignment has been adjudged by the Superior Court of Los Angeles in Action Number 564297, by judgment dated April 9, 1951, affirmed June 20, 1952, in 111 Cal.App.2d 833 [245 P.2d 514], and hearing thereon denied by the Supreme Court August 14, 1952. In that action it was found that “At the time of his death Sibert was the owner of record of a half interest in and to the invention covered by said application for Letters Patent and Shaver was the owner of record of a similar one-half interest, but each of such ownerships was subject to an agreement of the parties that the invention should be an asset of said partnership. At the time of his death Sibert was the owner of a one-half interest in said partnership.” It was then adjudged that “. . . in 1934 Clarence E. Sibert and George W. Shaver formed an equal partnership under the name, then or subsequently adopted, of S & S Specialty Co., for the creation of the invention covered by said Letters Patent and for the manufacture and sale of said invention, which partnership was in existence at the time of the death of Clarence E. Sibert; that said partnership has not been and the affairs of said partnership have not been wound up and settled by George W. Shaver, the surviving partner; that said partnership is the equitable owner of said Letters Patent and said invention and Rena C. Sibert and Mary Jane Cashin and George W. Shaver are ordered and directed to do everything necessary to vest in said partnership the record ownership of said Letters Patent and said invention.” Shortly before the trial of the instant action, the parties had formally transferred record ownership of the patent to the partnership.

By said judgment, it was further ordered ‘ ‘ That said partnership and the affairs thereof be wound up and settled by said George W. Shaver, as the surviving partner, and that George W. Shaver account to the estate of Clarence E. Sibert, Deceased, and to Rena C.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
289 P.2d 255, 136 Cal. App. 2d 621, 1955 Cal. App. LEXIS 1527, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/allen-v-shaver-calctapp-1955.