Hale v. Windsor Savings Bank

98 A. 993, 90 Vt. 487, 1916 Vt. LEXIS 305
CourtSupreme Court of Vermont
DecidedOctober 16, 1916
StatusPublished
Cited by19 cases

This text of 98 A. 993 (Hale v. Windsor Savings Bank) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Vermont primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hale v. Windsor Savings Bank, 98 A. 993, 90 Vt. 487, 1916 Vt. LEXIS 305 (Vt. 1916).

Opinion

Munson, J.

Joseph C. Enright, the executor of Amanda M. Pike, received a check for $5,125, payable to him as executor, and covering funds belonging to his testate’s estate. He [492]*492indorsed this check in blank as executor, added his personal indorsement, and deposited the check to his personal account in the Windsor Savings Bank, defendant herein, an institution doing a general banking business. The next day he took up six notes made by him and held by that Bank, amounting to $4,471.30, and paid two other personal liabilities to the Bank, amounting to $215, giving the Bank his personal check covering both sums. Enright died insolvent thirty months later, leaving a shortage in the Pike estate. The orators are the sureties on Enright’s probate bond, and have been sued for his default, and bring this bill to charge the Savings Bank on account of the -transaction above stated.

The executor’s indorsement in blank made the check payable to any one who might become the bearer, and made it available to such bearer for bank deposit by his becoming an indorser of it. Enright’s personal indorsement of this check properly designated it for deposit to his credit, and when credited in his personal account the bank owed the amount of the deposit to him personally, and in ordinary course was bound to pay it to his order on demand, unless a claim to it was asserted and established by some one else. The case presents the question whether the fact that this cheek was on its face the property of the Pike estate held in trust by Enright, and that Enright was on the face of the transaction applying it to his own use, made the bank liable for subsequently accepting payment from the account. In considering this question it will be necessary to have before us a statement of the circumstances attending the appropriation and a description of the obligations paid.

For a long time previous to this transaction Enright had been keeping an account with the defendant Savings Bank in his own name, subject to check, in which he deposited from time to time large sums received from various sources, including money and checks belonging to estates of which he was trustee or administrator, as well as money and checks received from an extensive and varied private business, and from a law business conducted by himself and orator Buck; and upon which he drew checks to pay debts and demands against himself, and the estates in his hands, and the law firm of Enright & Buck. This account showed a balance of $456 at the time the cheek in question was deposited. Other funds, amounting to $163.43, were [493]*493deposited at the same time. The deposit was made and the deposit slip filled out by Enright’s clerk and bookkeeper, and was received by the clerks of the defendant and credited to En-right’s account according to the direction of the deposit slip. The cheek in question, in going through the usual banking process, was handled solely by the defendant’s clerks.

All the notes taken up were payable on demand. One note, amounting with interest to $977, was signed by two sureties and secured by a policy of life insurance. Two notes, amounting to $1,158, were signed by the orator Buck as surety. A note for $1,200 was secured by a mortgage on three houses in Windsor, executed to Enright and assigned to the bank as collateral. A note for $800 was secured by an assignment of a note and the mortgage securing it on a house in Windsor. A note for $1,000, reduced by payment to $315, was secured by a mortgage on a brick block in Windsor owned by Enright. At the time of the transactions in question Enright was considered perfectly good financially; and later in the same year the defendant Bank loaned Enright, on notes signed by himself and Buck, sums about equal to the loans represented by the previous notes on which Buck was surety.

As before stated, Enright’s indebtedness was paid on the day following the deposit of the check; and it is found that the entries in the defendant’s cash book relating to the taking up of the notes, as well as the marginal figures of interest on each note and the discharge of the mortgage securing the $1,000 note, are in the handwriting of A. W. Harris, who was then the treasurer of the defendant Bank and has since deceased. Except as thus shown, the case does not disclose whether any officer of the Bank had personal knowledge of this check or of the disposal of it after it was deposited.

The accounts of the transactions in which the payments from Enright’s bank account were made, and of the payments themselves, were mostly kept by the bookkeeper of the law firm of Enright & Buck on Enright’s books, which were kept at the office of the firm, and were at all times open to the inspection of either member of the firm; and orator Buck from time to time made entries therein. The entries on these books showed in detail all the particulars relating to this check and the use to which it was put, except the fact that it was payable to En-right as executor of Amanda M. Pike.

[494]*494Orators Hale and Buck were appointed administrators of Enright’s estate, and upon examining the decedent’s accounts and affairs discovered that there was a shortage in the Pike estate. Hale learned from the books that Enright had received a check payable to the Pike estate, and had used it in paying some of his notes. Among the assets which came into the possession of the administrators were the properties securing the first, fourth and fifth notes above described, and from these they realized and placed among the general assets of the estate $2,600. Both líale and Buck presented and had allowed claims of considerable size against Enright’s estate. Orator Cabot knew, soon after Enright’s death, of his misappropriation of a part of the Pike estate, and knew that Hale and -Buck were his administrators, but he made no inquiry regarding the matter, and permitted the estate to go to final settlement without protest. Enright’s estate paid about fifty cents on the dollar.

Enright’s successor in the Pike trust, the defendant Windsor County Trust Company, having discovered that there was a shortage in the Pike estate,' demanded reimbursement from the sureties on Enright’s bond, the orators herein, and brought suit to inforee its claim. This occurred more than four years after the death of Enright and the appointment of the orators Hale and Buck as his administrators. The Savings Bank asserts as one ground of defence the laches, negligence and concealment of the orators. It is stated in the orator’s brief that the purpose of the suit is to compel the Trust Company to perform its duty and collect from the Savings Bank the trust fund belonging to its cestui que trust.

The claim that the matter is not cognizable in equity is unfounded. The contract arising from the transactions evidenced by a bank account is solely between the depositor and the bank, and has no reference to the beneficial ownership of the moneys deposited. No privity is created thereby between the bank and the one beneficially interested. The right of the beneficial owner as against the bank is equitable, and properly cognizable in a court of equity. Union Stockyards Nat. Bk. v. Gillespie, 137 U. S. 411, 34 L. ed. 724, 11 Sup. Ct. 118.

The claim that there can be no recovery because no officer of the bank had knowledge of the transaction is not sustainable. A bank is chargeable with the knowledge had by such agents as its teller and bookkeeper. It cannot claim to hold the money [495]

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Bluebook (online)
98 A. 993, 90 Vt. 487, 1916 Vt. LEXIS 305, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hale-v-windsor-savings-bank-vt-1916.