Byles v. Rowe

31 N.W. 463, 64 Mich. 522, 1887 Mich. LEXIS 726
CourtMichigan Supreme Court
DecidedJanuary 27, 1887
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 31 N.W. 463 (Byles v. Rowe) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Michigan Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Byles v. Rowe, 31 N.W. 463, 64 Mich. 522, 1887 Mich. LEXIS 726 (Mich. 1887).

Opinions

Sherwood, J.

The complainants file their bill, as assignees of Kellogg, Sawyer & Co., to set aside attachment and execution levies upon real estate described in the bill, and for an injunction preventing a sale of the property.

The attachment proceedings were commenced on the sixth day of November, 1883. The suit was prosecuted to judgment, and an execution was issued and levied upon the attached property.

On' the ninth day of November, 1883, Kellogg, Sawyer & Co. made a general assignment of all their property, for the benefit of their creditors, to the complainants. The lands attached were not only those included in the assignment, but also other lands which were not so assigned, but were claimed to be owned by Mrs. Sarah B. Kellogg, and occupied by her and her husband, Joseph E. Kellogg, as a homestead.

In February, 1884, two petitions were filed to dissolve the attachment, — one by the assignees, to remove it from the assigned property, and the other by Joseph E. Kellogg, to have it set aside as to his residence, which belonged to his wife and was occupied by the, family. The only ground for suing out the writ of attachment, stated in the affidavit, was [524]*524the belief, unsupported by any facts averred, that defendants “ are about to assign and dispose of their property with intent to defraud their creditors.”

These were heard before the-circuit judge, who found as a fact that there was no showing which justified suing out the writ of attachment, and dissolved the same in both cases.

Mrs. Kowe removed the cause into this Court by writ of certiorari. We then held that the learned circuit judge “was entirely correct in his inferences, and the plaintiff’s case does not appear to be meritorious,” and affirmed the decision of the circuit judge in the case of Joseph E. Kellogg; but, as regards the case of the assignees, Mr. Justice Campbell in his opinion says:

, “ It is certainly desirable that those who represent creditors, as these assignees do, should have some expeditious and simple way of getting rid of unjust seizures, but we cannot see how the statutory remedy can be made to reach their equities. So far as they are concerned, we are compelled to hold that the judge had no jurisdiction, as judge out of court, to .give them relief.”

The Court quashed the order in that case, but without prejudice to any other mode of redress. We further decided, ■in the case of the assignees, that the equities were clearly in their favor, and that we should have hesitated allowing the certiorari, and that we were not then prepared to sa.y the circuit court may not have some power to protect the assignees against such seizure. Rowe v. Kellogg, 54 Mich. 206.

The levy under the execution was made on the twenty-•sixth day of May, 1884, and the bill in this case was filed on the fifteenth day of August following.

After setting out the trust capacity in which complainants act for Kellogg, Sawyer & Co., giving a statement of the firm’s liabilities and assets, and the fact that the defendant is a creditor of the firm, and that her husband acted as her .agent in the management of her claim, the bill then states the legal proceedings taken to collect her claim, the com[525]*525mencement of the suit by attachment, and the facts alleged in the affidavit made by the defendant to obtain the writ, and avers that those allegations are false, and were known to be so when the affiant made them, and that by such false statements, and procuring the attachment issued upon such false affidavit upon property not belonging to Kellogg, Sawyer & Co., but upon the property of the individual members of said firm, a fraud was committed upon the rights of complainants, and upon the court.

The complainants further aver in their bill that the attachment lien in favor of the defendant upon said real estate is wholly without equity, and a fraud upon them and the other creditors whom they represent, both joint and individual; that it is the intent of the defendant to enforce said attachment lien against the property levied upon, and thereby collect her claim in full if the same can be realized from a forced sale of the property in the execution levied thereon, and which the defendant caused to be issued and procured to be levied for the purpose of continuing and. enforcing the attachment lien; that, by means of legal process, fraudulently and by imposition obtained from the court, the said defendant is about to cause the property in question to be advertised and sold upon the said execution levy, to the great injury of the complainants and all other creditors; and that the lien obtained under the levies upon the attachment and execution are void, and a cloud upon the title to the property they hold in trust, and which it is their duty as assignees to procure to be removed.

The defendant in her answer admits the legal proceedings taken as charged, but denies any fraud in the institution of the suit, or any intent to defraud in the prosecution of the suit to judgment, or in her efforts to collect said judgment after it was obtained. Defendant admits making the statements contained in the affidavit as charged, and avers she had good reason for making them. She denies that her lien [526]*526under the attachment is without equity, or a fraud upon complainants’ rights, or void, or a cloud upon complainants’ title. Defendant further admits that it is her intention to enforce her claim against the lands attached, under the liens she has obtained, and that the levy under the execution is only a continuance of the attachment lien.

Defendant further insists in her defense that any rights which complainants have in the real estate are subsequent to those of defendant, and subject thereto, and that complainants have no right in a court of equity to litigate the matters contained in their bill, and further claims that a court of equity has no jurisdiction to dissolve an attachment levied upon real estate; that the issuing, levy, and dissolution of attachments are all matters resting upon statute, and no authority is given to a court of equity to interfere.

The answer also prays the benefit of a demurrer.

The proofs in the case were taken in open court before Judge Mills, who upon the hearing of the cause rendered a decree, which, after referring to the real estate to be affected thereby, and which was attached, and finding that complainants hold the legal title thereto by virtue of the assignment, proceeds as follows:

And all of said real estate hereinbefore described having been levied upon by a writ of execution by the sheriff of the county of Kalamazoo, issued at the instance of the plaintiff in said attachment suit, the defendant herein, on the judgment rendered in the said attachment suit, and said complainants, at the time of the filing of their said bill, being in possession of said premises as assignees of said Kellogg, Sawyer & Co.; it is ordered, adjudged, and decreed that the said defendant, Florence V. Rowe, the plaintiff in said attachment suit, had no sufficient reason in law or fact to believe that Kellogg, Sawyer & Co., the defendants in said suit, were about to dispose of their property with intent to defraud their creditors, as stated by said Florence V. Rowe in her affidavit for, and as the ground for, said attachment; and in fact said Kellogg, Sawyer & Co.

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Bluebook (online)
31 N.W. 463, 64 Mich. 522, 1887 Mich. LEXIS 726, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/byles-v-rowe-mich-1887.