Farmers' Trust Co. v. Threlkeld's Administratrix

77 S.W.2d 616, 257 Ky. 211, 1934 Ky. LEXIS 538
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976)
DecidedNovember 20, 1934
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 77 S.W.2d 616 (Farmers' Trust Co. v. Threlkeld's Administratrix) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976) primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Farmers' Trust Co. v. Threlkeld's Administratrix, 77 S.W.2d 616, 257 Ky. 211, 1934 Ky. LEXIS 538 (Ky. 1934).

Opinion

Opinion of the Court by

Judge Richardson

Affirming in part and reversing in part.

Benna L. Willis, on the 15th day of July, 1932, brought an action in the Mercer circuit court against the Farmers’ Trust Company to rescind trades she claims she made with it in 1923 and 1924 for the purchase of'two notes — one for $3,000, dated February 3, 1923, payable on or before four years after date; the other for $1,500, dated January 7, 1924, due twelve months after date. The notes were executed and delivered by T. M. Horn, secured by a lien on land, and payable to the order of the Farmers’ Trust Company.

The administrator of the estate of Louella Threlkeld, on the 18th day of July, 1932, filed an action in the Mercer circuit court against the Farmers’ Trust Company to rescind a contract claimed to have been made by Louella Threlkeld with the Farmers’ Trust Company for a $3,000 note, dated February 3, 1929, payable on or before four years after date to the Farmers’ Trust Company.

*213 The actions were tried, and have been appealed, as one. We shall therefore dispose of them in one opinion.

It is charged in the petitions that the Farmers’ Trust Company is an ancillary corporation of the Mercer National Bank of Harrodsburg, Ky.; both owned by the same stockholders, managed by the same board of directors and officers.

It is charged that, at the time the notes were purchased of the Farmers’ Trust Company, Horn, the maker of the notes, was insolvent, and that the land on which there were mortgages to secure the notes was subject to prior and outstanding liens, and that the notes, respectively, purchased by them and secured by the mortgages, “were of doubtful value,” all of which were known to the Farmers’ Trust Company, and that for these reasons it desired to get rid of the notes.

Benna L. Willis, in her petition, charges that, at the time she acquired the two notes, the trust company assured her “each of them was good,” and “each a safe investment”; that she was a customer of the bank which was associated with the trust company and had her money on deposit in it at the time she purchased them, “and thereafter, for a number of years,” the interest was collected or pretended to be collected, on her notes by the bank and trust company, and credits therefor indorsed on the notes, when notice would be given to her that interest had been paid and placed to her credit in the bank, subject to her check; that a relation of trust and confidence existed between her and the Farmers’ Trust Company, and she wholly relied upon it in the purchasing the notes as investments, and it assumed and undertook to make investments for her; it knew Horn, the maker of the notes, the land on which the mortgages were to secure them, the indebtedness of Horn, and “of his doubtful and precarious financial condition.” She charges that the Farmers’ Trust Company failed, “by fraud or mistake,” to indorse the notes. She alleges on account of the fraud of the trust company and of her trust in, and reliance upon, it, she was thereby lulled into a sense of security, and did not discover that its representations and statements respecting the notes were falsely and fraudulently made until about three months next before the filing of her action; that the Farmers’ Trust Company assumed to, and did, act for her, in collecting the interest, and so did in order *214 to cause her not to discover its representations respecting the notes were false and fraudulent until the default in 1932 of payment of the interest on the notes; that until that time the Farmers’ Trust Company had complete and sole control of collecting the interest on the notes and placing the same to her credit in bank.

The administrator of Threlkeld’s estate, for cause of action, charges that a relation of trust and confidence existed between Louella Threlkeld and the trust company, and at its will it invested and reinvested her estate for her, and she relied entirely upon it in the management of her estate, and it undertook to make investments for her, and, having the $3,000 note of doubtful value, fraudulently, and with the purpose and design to relief itself of possible loss thereon, undertook to sell it to her, and thereafter from time to time collected interest theron for her and placed same to her credit in the Mercer National Bank of Harrodsburg, and continued so to do up until the death of Louella Threlkeld.

It is charged that neither Louella Thelkeld nor her administrator had possession of the note at any time, but the same was continuously in the possession of the Farmers’ Trust Company. This note was not indorsed by the Farmers’ Trust Company, and it is charged that the so transferring the same was a fraud on the rights of Louella Threlkeld.

Benna L. Willis and the administrator of Threlkeld pray in the alternative that the contract of purchaser of the notes be rescinded, or that'the Farmers’ Trust Company be required to indorse them, its liability as an indorser to begin with the indorsement.

Issues were formed by appropriate pleadings and on the evidence of the parties, on a trial before the court without the intervention of a jury, judgment was rendered for the amount of the notes in favor of the respective parties, less certain credits. It appears that the mortgaged land was sold and the $3,000 note held by Benna L. Willis credited by a portion of the proceeds.

The Mercer National Bank and the Farmers’ Trust Company are owned by the same stockholders, and their affairs and business are conducted by the same board of directors and officers. These facts within themselves do not destroy their separate corporate identity, nor create the relationship of principal and agent or repre *215 sentation between the two, or render the one liable for the contracts and obligations of the other.

We have held in a number of cases, “that where one corporation owns another, or another is merged in it, and the second corporation is only a name for the first, a judgment against the second may be enforced against the first.” Harlan, etc., Co. v. Eastern Construction Co., 254 Ky. 135, 71 S. W. (2d) 24, 29.

Neither of these actions is to recover of the bank a debt, or to enforce against it an obligation, of the Farmers’ Trust Company; nor to recover of the Farmers’ Trust Company on a debt or compel performance of a contract, of the Mercer National Bank. It is distinctly charged in the action of Willis and also in that of Threlkeld that the notes involved were acquired from the Farmers’ Trust Company; the notes on their face are payable to it. To escape its liabilities, the Farmers’ Trust Company presents, among others, the defense that, at the time Willis and Threlkeld assert they acquired title to the notes, they were owned and sold to them by the Mercer National Bank. It follows that, if they had knowledge thereof at the time and if the evidence sustains these allegations, then whatever causes of action accrued in favor of Willis and Threlkeld, the same were against the Mercer National Bank. The burden of proof rests upon the Farmers’ Trust Company to establish the Mercer National Bank’s ownership at the time the notes were purchased by them and knowledge thereof on the part of Willis and Threlkeld.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
77 S.W.2d 616, 257 Ky. 211, 1934 Ky. LEXIS 538, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/farmers-trust-co-v-threlkelds-administratrix-kyctapphigh-1934.