Finance Security Co. v. Stuart

75 So. 2d 353, 1954 La. App. LEXIS 551
Louisiana Court of Appeal·Decided October 6, 1954·No. No. 3877·Published·Cited by 5 cases

Opinion

ELLIS, Judge.

This suit was instituted hy the plaintiff via ordinaria on a promissory note executed by the defendant to bearer. A recognition and preservation of a chattel mortgage and vendor’s lien securing the note [354] was asked. The original petition did not allege the plaintiff was a holder in due course, and exceptions of no right and no cause of action were filed. These exceptions were argued and taken under advisement: by the Court, but before a decision thereon plaintiff -filed a supplemental and amended petition, alleging petitioner was the holder and owner of the note in due course for value before maturity. Thereupon the defendant caused a rule to isssue to- show cause why the order of the Court permitting the filing of a supplemental and amended petition should not be annulled. Upon hearing of this rule the Court dismissed it, allowing the amended petition to be filed, and overruled the exceptions of no right and no cause of action. Answer was filed, the defendant reconvening, claiming wrongful seizure and redhibitory defects, and a trial resulted in favor of the plaintiff in the sum prayed for, dismissing the reconventional demand.

The defendant has appealed.

The defendant-appellant assigns as errors of the trial court the following:

1. In permitting appellee, Finance Security Company, Inc., ex parte, to file a supplemental and amended petition completely changing the entire nature of the case in both law and in fact after issue was joined by the filing of exceptions of no right and no cause of action and the matter was under advisement by the Court at the time of the filing thereof.

2. By dismissing the rule taken upon ■ appellee, Finance Security Company, Inc., for said appellee to show cause why the order permitting the filing of the supplemental and amended petition should not be annulled, vacated and set aside.

3. In overruling the exceptions ot no right and no cause of action filed by appellant herein.

4. By sustaining the objections of counsel for appellee,’ Finance Security Company, Inc., to the offering of any evidence by counsel for appellant, G. T. Stuart, relative to any redhibitory defects in the mortgaged automobile described in appellee’s original petition since appellee failed to allege or prove that appellee was the holder and owner in due course before maturity and for a valuable consideration of the note purportedly identified with the purported act of sale and chattel mortgage covering the automobile described in appellee’s original petition.

5. In overruling the objections of counsel for appellant, G. T. Stuart, to the filing in evidence of the note and act of sale and chattel mortgage purportedly executed by G. T. Stuart in favor of Guidry Auto- Service, even though the evidence clearly shows that said act of sale and chattel mortgage and the note identified therewith were completely invalid, null, void and of no effect whatever.

6. In rendering judgment in favor of appellee herein, Finance Security Company, Inc., and against defendant and appellant, G. T. Stuart, with the record of this cause being completely devoid of any proof whatever as to appellee being the holder and owner in due course of the note purportedly identified with the purported act of sale and chattel mortgage; any payments or credits made on said account; that said account was in default; and any amount that was due and owing appellee by appellant, if any.

7. In failing to hold that the various acts of appellee, its agents and employees, in taking and removing the vehicle owned by appellant constituted a repossession or conversion of said vehicle.

8. In failing to render judgment in this cause in favor of appellant, as plaintiff in reconvention, for the amount prayed for by appellant.

Assignments 1 and 2 cover the same point and will be treated together.

The original petition did not allege the plaintiff was a holder in due course for value before maturity of the note sued upon. Issue was joined upon the filing of the exceptions and the appellant complains the plaintiff should not have been allowed to [355] amend his petition, which he did, to supply ■the necessary allegation. Under Article 419 of the Code of Practice our jurisprudence has held that permission of the Court must first be obtained before the filing of a supplemental and amended ■ petition once issue has been joined. Permission of the Court was obtained and the amendment did not change the nature of the cause.

This whole question was fully discussed in Arceneaux v. Louisiana Highway Commission, La.App., 5 So.2d 20, 23. There it was pointed out that, with the leave of Court, a petition which failed to state a necessary allegation could be amended where the issue was not changed. The fault with the original petition herein was that it did not contain an essential allegation. However, the assertions it did contain did not destroy the cause of action, but merely did not show that there could be recovery. The original petition was amended to show the plaintiff was a holder in. due course for value before maturity, and there was nothing in the original petition which contradicted this later allegation; the original petition did not negative the possibility . that the plaintiff was a holder in due course. Had the two petitions been incorporated into one, as was said in the Arceneaux case, “there would have been nothing inconsistent nor contradictory among the various allegations.” The Supreme Court in Reeves v. Globe Indemnity Co., 185 La. 42, 168 So. 488, 491, cited in the Arceneaux case, stated: “This conclusion is not only in accord with the weight of authority, but consonant with considerations of equity and the modern trend of liberality in upholding substantive rights instead of subtle technicalities.” As was said in the Arceneaux case, amendements might be permitted even after an exception of no right or cause of action had been sustained.

We find no error of the trial court as.set ' forth in the assignments of errors one and two.

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Finance Security Co. v. Stuart, 75 So. 2d 353, 1954 La. App. LEXIS 551 (La. Ct. App. 1954).

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