American Multigraph Sales Co. v. Globe Indemnity Co.

123 So. 358, 11 La. App. 353, 1929 La. App. LEXIS 615
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedJune 24, 1929
DocketNo. 11,238
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 123 So. 358 (American Multigraph Sales Co. v. Globe Indemnity Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
American Multigraph Sales Co. v. Globe Indemnity Co., 123 So. 358, 11 La. App. 353, 1929 La. App. LEXIS 615 (La. Ct. App. 1929).

Opinion

HIGGINS, J.

This is an action by the plaintiff against defendant as surety on a sequestration release bond. Plaintiff claims to have obtained a judgment for $607.50 against the defendant in a former suit, with recognition of its vendor’s lien and privilege on the property for which the sequestration release bond was given in the original suit. The petition alleges that a fi. fa. was directed against the defendant in the first suit and, having been returned nulla bona, that plaintiff had exhausted its remedies against the said defendant in the suit, and was entitled to hold the defendant, in the present suit upon the sequestration release bond, as surety.

Defendant admitted the execution of the bond, but denied liability on the following grounds:

First, that in the original suit judgment was rendered on November 8, 1926, and signed on November 15, 1926, in favor of the plaintiff and against defendant, without recognizing and maintaining plaintiff’s vendor’s lien and privilege upon the property sequestered, and therefore was a mere personal judgment in favor of plaintiff and against defendant that had the legal effect of rejecting plaintiff’s claim on the writ of sequestration and plaintiff’s assertion of the vendor’s lien and privilege, thereby releasing and discharging the surety from any liability on the bond.
Second, that on January 19, 1927, long after the said judgment had become final, anc after plaintiff, on November 25, 1926, had issued a -fi. fa. based thereon, plaintiff and defendant in the original suit sought to amend the judgment on joint motion of plaintiff and defendant therein, so as to incorporate therein a provision recognizing and maintaining the vendor’s lien and privilege upon the property seized, and for which the sequestration release bond had been given; that the order of court based on the joint motion to amend the original judgment is null and void for the reason that said judgment in the original suit was final, and accordingly not within the power or jurisdiction of the district court to amend the same.
Third, that the defendant in the. original suit, having been placed in the receivership proceedings, that the receiver had no power or right to waive any legal right or defense of said receivership and, even if effective between the parties consenting thereto, could not bind or create a liability upon the defendant as surety upon the sequestration release bond.

There are other alternative defenses which we do not consider necessary to recite, in view of the conclusions that we have reached. There was judgment in favor of plaintiff in this ouit for $650 and defendant herein appealed.

The facts leading up to the question which this court must decide on the present appeal are somewhat complicated, and involve three different suits in the Civil District Court.

On July 10, 1924, the American Multigraph Sales Company sued the PeachBlo Products, Inc., on a written contract to recover the balance of the purchase price of $607.50 for certain equipment. [355]*355The original petition did not ask for the recognition of the vendor’s lien and privilege on the equipment, hut, by supplemental petition, plaintiff in said suit asserted its vendors’ lien and privilege upon the property sold, and prayed for and obtained a writ of sequestration. On April 30, 1925, the defendant in said suit obtained an order authorizing the release of the property sequestered upon furnishing a bond in the sum of a thousand dollars, which bond was signed by the Globe Indemnity Company, as surety, the present defendant herein. This bond was executed and filed on May 1, 1925.

While this suit was pending and untried a receiver was appointed in the Civil District Court for the Peach-Bio Products, Inc., on April 7, 1926. The property released by the sequestration bond was inventoried as an asset by the receiver, and sold separately in the receivership proceedings for the sum of $100. In the final account of the receiver, the state and city taxes, which primed the vendor’s lien of the American Multigraph Sales Company, were paid out of this fund of a hundred dollars, completely consuming same. In the meantime, on November 8, 1926, an ordinary judgment was obtained by plaintiff against defendant, in the original suit, without recognizing or maintaining the vendor’s privilege asserted by plaintiff. It appears that the district court judge intended to place a decree in the judgment recognizing the vendor’s lien and ' privilege, and maintaining the writ of sequestration, because the- clerk was instructed to draw up judgment as prayed for. However, the clerk erroneously followed the original petition in the original suit, which did not pray for recognition of the vendor’s lien and privilege and for a writ of sequestration. This judgment was signed on November 15, 1926, and the delays for a new trial and suspensive appeal elapsed without any party to the suit asking for a new trial or a suspensive appeal. Plaintiff in the original suit caused a fi. fa. to be issued on November 26, 1926, which was returned nulla bona on December 19, 1926. Plaintiff then filed a rule for a judgment against the Globe Indemnity Company, as surety on the sequestration release bond, on December 9, 1926. This rule was dismissed on January 7, 1927, upon exception of defendant in rule on the ground that plaintiff should have proceeded by direct action and not by rule.

Thereafter, the plaintiff evidently discovered the omission from the judgment of the decree maintaining the sequestration, or recognizing the asserted vendor’s privilege. On January 19, 1927, two months after the signing of the ordinary judgment, plaintiff obtained the signature of the attorney for the receiver of the defendant in the original suit, to a joint motion to the" effect that the recital of the maintenance of the vendor’s privilege was erroneously omitted from' this judgment. Upon the basis of this motion, the district judge signed an order on the same day to the effect that the judgment be amended so as to include the words “with recognition of plaintiff’s vendor’s lien and privilige upon the property seized.” The surety on the sequestration release bond never consented to or authorized this amendment.

On January 25, 1927, the present suit was instituted by plaintiff against defendant as surety on the sequestration release bond, upon the basis of the judgment rendered in the original proceeding on November 15, 1926, and amended judgment of January 19, 1927. The case was tried on its merits on October 17, 1927, and resulted in a judgment for plaintiff against defendant for the sum of $650, which judgment was signed on October 25, 1927, and [356]*356from which defendant prosecutes this appeal.

On November 10, 1927, the American Multigraph Sales Company, as plaintiff in the original suit, filed a petition for a devolutive appeal from the ordinary judgment rendered on November 8, 1926, and signed November 15, 1926. The evident purpose of the appeal is to have this Court supply the omission from the judgment of a decree maintaining the writ of sequestration and recognizing the asserted vendor’s lien.

We will first take up the question as to whether or not the judgment in the original suit, in its original form, could form the basis of a claim against the surety on the sequestration release bond. This judgment was a mere personal or ordinary judgment in favor of plaintiff against the defendant, with no mention of sequestration or the vendor’s privilege.

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Related

Glen Falls Indemnity Co. v. Manning
168 So. 787 (Louisiana Court of Appeal, 1936)
State ex rel. Sehrt v. Registrar of Conveyances
129 So. 197 (Louisiana Court of Appeal, 1930)
American Multigraph Sales Co. v. Peach Blo Products, Inc.
123 So. 362 (Louisiana Court of Appeal, 1929)

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Bluebook (online)
123 So. 358, 11 La. App. 353, 1929 La. App. LEXIS 615, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/american-multigraph-sales-co-v-globe-indemnity-co-lactapp-1929.