Dinsmoor v. Bressler

56 Ill. App. 207, 1893 Ill. App. LEXIS 676
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedMay 22, 1894
StatusPublished

This text of 56 Ill. App. 207 (Dinsmoor v. Bressler) 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
Dinsmoor v. Bressler, 56 Ill. App. 207, 1893 Ill. App. LEXIS 676 (Ill. Ct. App. 1894).

Opinion

Mb. Justice Lacey

delivered the opinion oe the Court.

This was a proceeding commenced before the County Court by appellee by citation against appellant. Commenced under Sec. 81 and 82 (80 and 81) Hurd’s Be vised Statutes, 1891, Chap. 3, page 222.

The appellee stated under oath before the County Court, in an affidavit filed therein in the manner provided by statute, that the First National Bank of Morrison paid James Dinsmoor and Jarvis Dinsmoor, acting attorneys for the estate of said Abram Ulmer, deceased, the sum of about $1,030, belonging to the said estate; that out of said sum affiant was informed that Dinsmoors paid the sum of about $300 on the award of Nancy Ulmer; that the remainder of said sum, to wit, about $730, said Dinsmoors retained in their possession, and they refused to pay the same to affiant as such administrator of the estate of Abram Ulmer, deceased, although often requested so to do by the affiant. The affiant therefore prayed for a citation as required by the statute.

The citation was issued accordingly and served on both parties, and on the 10th of October, 1892, a hearing was had before the County Court, resulting in finding that James Dinsmoor had received the $1,030 from said bank, as alleged, and had not paid any of it out, and ordered him to pay over to appellee the said sum within ten days, and that appellee have execution therefor, and the proceeding as to Jarvis Dinsmoor was dismissed. The appellant perfected an appeal to the Circuit Court. In the Circuit Court the appellant moved to dismiss the proceeding for want of jurisdiction of the Probate Court, of the subject-matter, which motion was overruled by the courts and exception entered on the record by appellant

Then the appellant moved the court to transfer the case to the chancery side of the docket, which was overruled by the court, and exception taken by appellant on the record.

On the 5th day of June, 1893, the Circuit Court heard the case, and found that James Dinsmoor had in his hands the sum of $700, belonging to said estate, and ordered that he pay appellee for the use of said estate the sum of $700, within twenty days from that date, and that in default of such payment, appellee have execution therefor, and that appellant pay the costs of the proceeding to be taxed. To the making of such order the appellant excepts, as is shown by the order, but not in the bill of exceptions.

Section 81 of the statute under which this proceeding was had, reads as follows:

“ Sec. 81. If any executor or administrator, etc., * * * shall state upon oath, to any County Court, that he believes that any person has in (his) possession, or has concealed or embezzled, any goods, chattels, moneys or effects, books of account, papers, or any evidence of debt whatever, etc,, * * * the court shall require such person to appear before it, by citation, and may examine him on oath, and hear the testimony of such executor or administrator, and other evidence offered by either party, and make such- order in the premises as the case may require.” This act was approved March 19, 1873, and takes the place of the former act. B. S., 1845, p. 556, Sec. 90.

Sec. 82. “ If such person refuses to answer any interrogatory as may be propounded to him, or refuses to deliver up such property or effects, or in case the same has been converted, the proceeds, or value thereof, upon a requisition being made for that purpose by an order of such court, such court may commit such person to jail until he shall comply with the order of court therein.”

It is insisted by appellant that the facts set out in the affidavit filed by appellee, precedent to the issuance of the citation, does not show a case wherein the County Court, or the Circuit Court, on appeal, had jurisdiction to proceed by citation under the above sections of the statute:

First. Because the Probate Court can not adjudicate concerning a contract between client and attorney, and because an attorney has a lien on the money collected, for his fees, and the County Court can not adjudicate that matter.

Second. The County Court has no power to order an execution, and neither had the Circuit Court on appeal.

Third. It is insisted that proceeding under the statute can be only in cases where an action of replevin or trover would lie, and would not be where a party proceeded against did not have the money in specie. The following cases are cited: "Williams v. Candy, 20 Ill. 643; Wade v. Prichard, 69 Ill. 279. The question arises in this case whether an attorney at law, employed by an administrator to collect money for an estate of these parties, who fails and refuses to turn over any money collected by him. as such attorney, after demand by the person entitled to the same, can be proceeded against under said section 81 of the above recited statute. It seems to us there can be no doubt of the power to thus proceed against such attorney in such manner. Any one, according to the terms of the statute, who has “embezzled” any “ moneys ” or other goods or chattels, may be proceeded against under the statute by citation. In this State, however otherwise it may have been at common law, money collected by an attorney at law for his client, is not the property of an attorney in such manner as that he is not guilty of embezzlement if he appropriate it to his own use.

Our statute treats an attorney at law, in respect to the moneys he collects for his clients and fails to turn over to them on demand, the same in a criminal point of view as justice of the peace, clerk of the court or other person authorized by law to collect money, and subjects him to punishment as an embezzler to fine and imprisonment in the county jail and disqualifies him from practicing his profession ever after in this State. Sec. 79, Chap. 38, B. S. The statute recognizes such an attorney as a mere agent for the collection of claims intrusted to his charge, and in case of his refusal to pay over moneys collected for his clients he may be debarred from practicing his profession in this State. Sec. 7, Chap. 14, R. S. In Blair v. Sinnott, 134 Ill. 78, it was held that “ money of the principal in the hands of an agent is still the money of the principal, and the agent has no right to use it or pay it out for his own private purposes.” Further the court uses this language: “ While he has his money he is not technically the creditor of his principal but simply his trustee. It is in such case, therefore, always the legal presumption that the money in the hands of the agent is the identical money that he received, and he will not be heard to allege his embezzlement or breach of trust to escape a liability arising from that presumption. Mechera, on Agency, Sec. 785: Story on Agency, Secs. 229, 230; Trustees v. McCormick, 41 Ill. 323; Colton v. Halliday, 59 Ill. 170.” We think this case falls within the statutory jurisdiction so far as the subject-matter of the claim is concerned. By the court, in Blair v. Sinnott, supra, it was also held that the statute contemplates not only moneys, etc., placed in the hands of the party charged, but such as comes to his hands after the deceased’s death. And we see no reason why the language of the statute does not cover cases where the goods, chattels, moneys, etc., were placed in the hands of the party charged by the administrator himself.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Parsons v. Evans
17 Ill. 238 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1855)
Williams v. Conley
20 Ill. 643 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1858)
Trustees of Schools v. C. H. McCormick & Bros.
41 Ill. 323 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1866)
Wade v. Pritchard
69 Ill. 279 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1873)
David M. Force Manufacturing Co. v. Horton
74 Ill. 310 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1874)
James v. Dexter
113 Ill. 654 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1885)
Sanders v. Seelye
21 N.E. 601 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1889)
Johnson v. Leman
7 L.R.A. 656 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1890)
Blair v. Sennott
24 N.E. 969 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1890)
Kingsberry v. Hutton
140 Ill. 603 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1892)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
56 Ill. App. 207, 1893 Ill. App. LEXIS 676, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dinsmoor-v-bressler-illappct-1894.