D. C. Wise Coal Co. v. Columbia Lead & Zinc Co.

100 S.W. 680, 123 Mo. App. 249, 1907 Mo. App. LEXIS 303
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedMarch 5, 1907
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 100 S.W. 680 (D. C. Wise Coal Co. v. Columbia Lead & Zinc Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
D. C. Wise Coal Co. v. Columbia Lead & Zinc Co., 100 S.W. 680, 123 Mo. App. 249, 1907 Mo. App. LEXIS 303 (Mo. Ct. App. 1907).

Opinion

BLAND, P. J.

On December 7, 1903, plaintiff commenced his snit against the Columbia Lead & Zinc Co., in the circuit court, by attachment, to recover a balance of $904.70, alleged to be due on account of coal sold and delivered to defendant. A writ of attachment was issued and delivered to the sheriff of Jasper county, by virtue of which that officer attached a lot of mining-machinery, specifically described in the return indorsed on the back of the writ. Defendant was served with summons and at the return term of the writ filed its plea in abatement of the attachment and its ansAver to the merits, admitting it Avas a corporation, but denying all other allegations of the petition, and at the same time filed its application for a change of venue, which was granted, and the venue changed to the Newton Circuit Court. At the April term, 1904, of the Newton Circuit Court, a judgment by default, sustaining the attachment, and on the merits, Avas rendered in favor of plaintiff and against defendant, and a special execution awarded against all the property attached.' On January 29, 1904, defendant, as principal, and the United States Fidelity & Guaranty Co., as surety, executed to plaintiff a forthcoming bond for the attached property, Avhich bond was appmved by the sheriff of Jasper county. An execution Avas -issued on the judgment, commanding the sheriff to levy upon and sell the attached property. The sheriff returned this execution nulla tona, whereupon the court, on October 14, 1904, made an order requiring defendant to produce the attached property and deliver the same on or before October 24, [254]*2541904. It was further ordered that if defendant should fail to produce the property as directed, the sheriff of Jasper county should immediately assign the forthcoming bond to plaintiff. The attached property was not produced and the sheriff of Jasper county assigned the forthcoming bond to plaintiff, and afterwards, to-wit, on December 12, 1904, plaintiff filed its motion, in the Newton Circuit Court, for judgment on the forthcoming bond. On the same day defendant filed its motion to set aside the judgment and the orders made thereunder. On the seventeenth day of the same month, the motion was taken up and heard and by the court overruled, and leave given to continue the motion for judgment on the forthcoming bond to the next term. At the next (April, 1905) term the following motion (omitting caption) was filed:

“Now come the said defendant, and also B. D. Mowry as trustee in bankruptcy of and for the said defendant company, and also the United States Fidelity and Guaranty Company, all of whom appear for the purposes of this application only, and by way of amendment of their several and respective applications of like nature heretofore filed herein at the preceding term of this court, and respectfully show to the said court that the above-entitled cause was instituted, and the attachment of the defendant’s personal property herein was had, on the seventh day of December, 1903, and defendant was summoned and answered therein.
“That on the twenty-fifth day of March, 1904, certain creditors of the defendant company, viz: First National Bank of Galva, Illinois; the First National Bank of Carterville, Missouri et al.; presented and filed in the District Court of the United States for the Southwestern Division Judicial District of the Western District of Missouri, as a Court of Bankruptcy, their concurrent petition for the adjudication of the said defendant as a bankrupt, under the statutes and acts of bankruptcy of [255]*255the United States, because of the existence of certain alleged grounds thereof, including the fact of defendant’s insolvency.
“That thereon the said court did solemnly adjudicate the defendant company, on the twenty-eighth day of March, 1904, to be a bankrupt within the meaning and under the. said statutes and acts, whereby said attachment was dissolved and made void; following which the said court did, on the thirteenth day of April, 1904, on petition of said bankrupt, order and enjoin, as against plaintiff, its attorneys and agents, with other alleged creditors, complete stay and cessation of all and whatever proceedings against the property and effects of defendant, including the property attached as aforesaid, and all manner of interference therewith by any action in the State courts, including the above-entitled case and this court.
“That the said court did, on the twenty-sixth day of April, 1904, duly appoint and qualify B. D. Mowry to be trustee in bankruptcy of and for the defendant company and its property and effects, including the said attached property, which property the said trustee did forthwith take possession and charge of as such trustee under the orders and control of the said Court of Bankruptcy; and the plaintiff and its attorney of record, H. S. Miller immediately and fully, were notified and advised of the said adjudication of bankruptcy and of the said restraining order of said court and expressed to defendant acquiescence therein.
“That, nevertheless, the plaintiff and its said attorney, fraudulently intending and contriving to circumvent the said bankrupt court, evade the bankrupt law and secure unfairly the equivalent of a preference over other creditors of the said bankrupt in respect of the said property, fraudulently and in violation of the said restraining order, did appear in this court on the twentieth day of April, 1904, Avithout notice, summons or in[256]*256timation thereof to defendant, to the trustee in bankruptcy or to other interested person, and moved the court1 to sustain the said attachment, enter irregular judgment against the defendant and the said property in the above-entitled cause, and then and there fraudulently refrained from disclosing to the court the aforesaid facts, and concealed from the court the said adjudication and restraining order, and procured the court, (by fraud and deceit, and by presenting to the court the said attachment and representing the same to be valid and live attachment against the said property upon which the plaintiff! falsely represented and pretended that it was entitled to judgment, etc., when they knew better), to enter illegal but formal judgment sustaining the said attachment as valid and binding upon the said property and to adjudicate against the said property, in rem, a debt of said bankrupt to plaintiff in the sum of $909.82 and costs of the action, all in pursuance of the said void attachment, which said judgment is found at page 125 of book 30 of this court’s record.
“That in continuation of the said fraudulent purpose and in execution of the said wrongful intent, the plaintiff and its said attorney did also have special execution issued against the said property on the said void judgment out of the office of the clerk of this court, on the fourteenth day of June, 1901, to the said sheriff of Jasper county, and did likewise also have and obtain from this court, on the fourteenth day of October, 1901, further void entry order of this court against the defendant company and bankrupt, requiring delivery of the said property to the said sheriff, which order was procured by plaintiff and its attorney upon application containing the unfounded and false assumption before and deceitful representation to the court at the time that the sheriff had taken and returned, although he had not, a forthcoming bond executed by said defendant company with the said United States Fidelity & Surety Company [257]

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Bluebook (online)
100 S.W. 680, 123 Mo. App. 249, 1907 Mo. App. LEXIS 303, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/d-c-wise-coal-co-v-columbia-lead-zinc-co-moctapp-1907.