Dietzel v. Martin

59 S.W.2d 863, 1933 Tex. App. LEXIS 614
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedMay 3, 1933
DocketNo. 2358
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 59 S.W.2d 863 (Dietzel v. Martin) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Dietzel v. Martin, 59 S.W.2d 863, 1933 Tex. App. LEXIS 614 (Tex. Ct. App. 1933).

Opinion

O’QUINN, Justice.

On December 6, 1926, appellant executed and delivered to Wimer-Richardson & Co., an investment corporation, four notes for a total of $10,000, payable to bearer or order, bearing 7 per cent, interest and providing for attorney’s fees. They were numbered 1 to 4, and payable at the office of Wimer-Riehard-son & Co. in San Antonio, Tex., “on or before” one, two, three, and four years from date, respectively. Appellant also executed and delivered to Wimer-Richardson & Co. certain interest coupon notes, payable to bearer or order, at the office of Wimer-Richardson & Co., and to secure the payment of all of said notes he executed and delivered to Wimer-Richardson & Co. a deed of trust covering certain real estate in San Antonio. This deed of trust was duly recorded.

About a month after the execution of the notes, on January 4, 1927, appellee, Virginia Martin, acting through her agent and attorney, O. C. Clamp, purchased from Wimer-Richardson & Co. notes Nos. 2, 3, and 4 of said series of notes, and paid for same the sum of $8,045.11, being $8,000 principal and $45.11 interest which had accrued to that-date, and said notes Nos. 2, 3, and 4 were then delivered by said Wimer-Richardson & Co. to said C. C. Clamp for said Virginia Martin, and by said Clamp delivered to her. There was no written transfer of said notes. If notes sold by said company were payable to bearer or order, as here, the company did not usually give a transfer, unless specially requested.

On December 1, 1927, appellant sold the real estate mortgaged to secure the payment of said four notes, and on said date paid to Wimer-Richardson & Co. the sum of $8,280 as full payment of said notes Nos. 2, 3, and 4, which said Wimer-Riehardson & Co. had, on January 4,1927, sold to appellee, and received [864]*864from said company a receipt for said sum and a release of the deed of trust lien on the real estate securing the payment of said notes, which recites that Wimer-Richardson & Oo. was the legal owner and holder of the notes in question; that it had received payment in full of same, and had canceled and annulled said notes and the deed of trust lien given to secure their payment, and fully released said real estate “forever free, clear and acquitted of the above described deed of trust lien and vendor’s lien that were made and created, as above recited, to secure the payment of the four notes above described.”

Coincident with the sale and delivery of said notes Nos. 2, 3, and 4 to Virginia Martin, Wimer-Richardson & Co. executed a written guaranty in which it obligated itself to '“protect said guarantee against any loss of any of the principal of said notes * * * and any interest thereon,” and further that “guarantor will collect the principal and interest of said notes for the guarantee without charge,” and would insure the property involved against certain described losses. The issuance of this guaranty was a matter of record in the office of said Wimer-Richardson & Co., and appeared among the files of “Loan No. 2423,” which showed the transaction with Virginia Martin through her attorney, C. C. Clamp.

The interest coupon notes were paid as they matured to the date of the bankruptcy of said company.

On December 4, 1927, when Dietzel paid to Wimer-Richardson & Co. the sum of $8,280, to be applied in full payment of the notes 2, 3, and 4, Wimer-Richardson & Co. accepted the payment for that purpose, and, as before stated, gave Dietzel its receipt therefor and a release of the deed of trust lien securing the payment of said notes, and credited the $8,-280 upon its account with Virginia Martin, but concealed from Virginia Martin and her agent and attorney, Clamp, the fact that it had collected the money and appropriated said money to its own use and benefit. It is conceded that neither Clamp nor Miss Martin had any knowledge of the payment of the money.

On October 22, 1929, Wimer-Richardson & Co. was placed in receivership, and on March 12, 1930, was adjudged a bankrupt. On January 23, 1930, appellant, alleging that he had “only recently been informed” that appellee claimed that she was, and for “several years” had been, the legal owner and holder of the notes 2, 3, and 4 in question, filed this suit with full allegations of the facts relative to the execution and delivery of the notes and deed of trust to Wimer-Richardson & Co. and the payment of same to said company, and its receipt for the money and release of the deed of trust lien. He prayed for judgment canceling the notes and that appellee be required to surrender and deliver said notes to him. Appellee answered, and in a cross-action prayed for judgment against appellant for the full amount of the notes, interest, and attorney’s fees. The case was tried to the court without a jury, and judgment rendered that appellant take nothing by his suit, and that appellee have judgment against appellant as prayed for. The case is before us on appeal.

Appellant presents numerous assignments of error; but as we view the record, the questions are few, and we shall discuss them instead of considering the assignments in the order presented.

Appellant’s allegation in his petition and his insistence that the notes in question were nonnegotiable is without force. The fact that they were payable to bearer does not make them nonnegotiable. Subdivision 4 of section 1 of article 5932, R. S., expressly provides that for an instrument to be negotiable it must be payable to order or to bearer. And article' 5934, § 30, provides that if an instrument is payable to bearer it is negotiated by delivery. In the instant case the notes were payable to bearer and were negotiated by Wimer-Richardson & Co., the owner and'holder, selling and delivering them to appellee by delivering them to her agent and attorney, C. C. Clamp.

The contention of appellant that Wi-mer-Richardson & Co. had express authority, and if not express then implied or ostensible authority, from appellee to accept and receive the money paid to it by appellant in full satisfaction of the three notes, is overruled. The question is one of fact, and we do not believe that there is any evidence in the record to show that Miss Martin had in any manner expressly authorized Wimer-Richard-son & Oo. to act as her agent in receiving money in payment of the notes. To the contrary, Bliss Martin testified that Wimer-Richardson & Co. was never at any time her agent for any purpose. It is without dispute that Wi-mer-Richardson & Co. did not have in their possession the notes in question, but that Bliss Martin had possession of them at all times from the date of their purchase by her, as the ■owner and holder of same.

It is true that Wimer-Richardson & Co. collected the interest coupon notes from appellant, credited appellee’s account therewith, as they were presented by appellee, but this did not make Wimer-Richardson & Co. the agent of appellee for the collection of the principal notes. Cunningham v. McDonald, 98 Tex. 316, 83 S. W. 372, 373; Higley v. Dennis, 40 Tex. Civ. App. 133, 88 S. W. 400; Case Note, 23 L. R. A. (N. S.) 418. In this last citation, the applicable rule is thus stated: “That one other than the holder of securities collected the interest thereon, without the possession thereof,, for the holder, without protest on his part, is not sufficient to raise [865]*865a presumption or implication of authority to collect the principal without the possession of such securities.” (Citing numerous authorities, including the Texas cases above cited.) See 8 O.

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Related

Dietzel v. Martin
68 S.W.2d 159 (Texas Commission of Appeals, 1934)

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59 S.W.2d 863, 1933 Tex. App. LEXIS 614, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dietzel-v-martin-texapp-1933.