Crest Finance Co., Inc. v. First State Bank

214 N.E.2d 526, 66 Ill. App. 2d 364, 1966 Ill. App. LEXIS 1263
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedJanuary 7, 1966
DocketGen. 50,169
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 214 N.E.2d 526 (Crest Finance Co., Inc. v. First State Bank) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Crest Finance Co., Inc. v. First State Bank, 214 N.E.2d 526, 66 Ill. App. 2d 364, 1966 Ill. App. LEXIS 1263 (Ill. Ct. App. 1966).

Opinion

MR. JUSTICE MURPHY

delivered the opinion of the court.

This is an appeal from a decree of the Circuit Court of Cook County which dismissed, for want of equity, a complaint in chancery filed April 30, 1963, whereby plaintiff sought a decree directing the defendant bank to deliver to plaintiff commercial paper and collateral of a face value of approximately $900,000.

On May 16, 1963, Joseph E. Knight, Director of the Department of Financial Institutions in the State of Illinois, took possession of the defendant bank, and on May 24, 1963, filed a complaint in the Circuit Court of DuPage County for its dissolution. On the same day, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation was appointed receiver of the defendant bank. On June 25, 1963, the receiver was granted leave to intervene in the instant cause and to file its intervening petition. Leave was also granted to the receiver to make Leo Niederberger a third-party defendant.

The pleadings consist of a complaint, answer of the defendant bank, reply of the plaintiff thereto, and the intervening petition of the receiver.

Plaintiff, Crest Finance Company, is an Illinois corporation, engaged in the business of making loans to small businesses. Crest’s borrowers sign promissory notes and, as collateral security for their loans, assign chattel mortgages, accounts receivable, conditional sales contracts, or similar commercial paper. Third-party defendant, Leo Niederberger, is president and treasurer of Crest and, with his wife, owned all of its outstanding stock. In order to secure funds for Crest by loans from Chicago area banks to Crest, Niederberger personally guaranteed in excess of $900,000 of Crest indebtedness to these banks. He had also agreed with the banks that none of the commercial paper held by Crest would be pledged by Crest as security.

Early in March, 1963, Niederberger decided he would sell ownership of Crest. Lester Brock was introduced to Niederberger as a potential purchaser of Crest by a business broker, Otto Stephani. Brock was a business man and a stockholder in defendant, First State Bank of Westmont. He was also manager of a corporation known as State Street Securities, a company owned by Norman Weaver and Lawrence Stickell. Weaver and Stickell were also the principal owners of the First State Bank of Westmont, having acquired control of the Westmont Bank in February, 1963. Stickell was a director of the bank, and Weaver was chairman of its board.

Throughout his negotiations with Niederberger, Brock represented that he was acting for others, but he never disclosed their identity. He testified later that Stickell was in fact his principal, and that Weaver also had knowledge of the transaction.

On April 2, 1963, an offer to purchase agreement, dated March 30, 1963, was entered into by Niederberger and Brock. Brock agreed to (1) pay Niederberger $600,000 for all of the outstanding shares of Crest stock which stood in the name of Niederberger and his wife; and (2) substitute Brock’s personal guarantee for Niederberger’s on $900,000 of Crest promissory notes held by Chicago banks, which previously had been personally guaranteed by Niederberger. In the alternative, Brock was to pay off the total bank indebtedness and eliminate Niederberger’s “liability on any and all of such items.” The selling price was arrived at as follows: ■

Book value $250,000
Reserves 80,000
Unearned income 120,000
Good will 150,000
Total $600,000 .

Niederberger agreed “to execute or cause to be executed all documents necessary to consummate the sale of the said stock, and all matters coincidental.” Niederberger was to “continue to operate the business of Crest Finance Company, Inc., in the same manner as heretofore,” in cooperation with the buyer for at least three months, at a salary of $1,000 per month.

The agreement was executed at Crest’s office on April 2, 1963. Present were Brock, Niederberger, Stephani (the broker), Hamilton Clorfene (Niederberger’s lawyer) and Wayne Willard (Westmont’s executive vice president and cashier). Willard testified that he participated in the meeting under the instructions of “[t]he Chairman of the Board, Mr. Weaver; and Mr. Stickell, a Director.” Willard had brought four blank Westmont Bank drafts on Chicago banks. At Niederberger’s direction, Willard made three of the drafts payable to Niederberger and inserted amounts totaling $600,000. The Crest stock was not endorsed, transferred or delivered to Brock at that time, but was placed in escrow with Niederberger’s lawyer, to be held until such time as Brock had either substituted himself as guarantor or paid off all the $900,000 bank loans on which Niederberger was secondarily liable. The escrow receipt, dated. April 2, 1963, and signed by Hamilton Clorfene, was as follows:

“The undersigned hereby acknowledges the receipt of three stock certificates for a total of Seven Hundred Fifty Shares of the common stock of Crest Finance Co., Inc., an Illinois corporation, .... The undersigned agrees to hold the stock as eserowee under the following condition: Upon written advice from Leo Niederberger that he has been released from all personal liability as guarantor of Crest Finance Co., Inc., the undersigned agrees to deliver all of the said stock of Crest Finance Co., Inc. to Lester A. Brock.”

On April 2, 1963, shortly after receiving the drafts totaling $600,000, Niederberger left the meeting at Crest’s office to go to the Irving Bank to deposit the drafts in his personal account. During his absence, Brock and Willard then took approximately $800,000 of commercial paper from Crest’s office and removed it to the Westmont Bank.

On April 3, 1963, Willard, together with an assistant, returned to the Crest offices and remained there the entire day. He testified that both Mr. and Mrs. Niederberger were there on the 3rd, and that Niederberger helped Willard remove some of the commercial paper, and by the end of the 4th of April, Willard had taken to Westmont “roughly a million dollars worth of paper,” although he did not stop to audit it at that time. Willard left some receipts for part of the collateral, bearing the inscription “Received—Bank of Westmont—Wayne Willard.” Niederberger was at the Crest office only briefly during thése several days. He observed Willard photostating some documents and met with several customers of Crest. He testified that he thought it was the credit files that were being removed for audit, and that he specifically told Willard and Brock not to remove the commercial paper. It was about April 15, 1963, when he learned for the first time that “the First State Bank of Westmont was in possession of documents or securities which had been or was the property of Crest Finance Company.”

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Related

Jones v. Matthis
374 N.E.2d 813 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1978)
Crest Finance Co. v. First State Bank
248 N.E.2d 809 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1969)
Crest Finance Co. v. First State Bank
226 N.E.2d 369 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1967)
United States v. Norman H. Weaver
360 F.2d 903 (Seventh Circuit, 1966)

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Bluebook (online)
214 N.E.2d 526, 66 Ill. App. 2d 364, 1966 Ill. App. LEXIS 1263, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/crest-finance-co-inc-v-first-state-bank-illappct-1966.