Halladay v. Worthington

99 Misc. 141
CourtNew York Supreme Court
DecidedFebruary 15, 1917
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 99 Misc. 141 (Halladay v. Worthington) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Halladay v. Worthington, 99 Misc. 141 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1917).

Opinion

Bissell, J.

This action has been brought to establish a first lien, which the plaintiff claims to have on the George H. Worthington collection of postage stamps, arising out of the following transaction: On May 7, 1912, the plaintiff was the apparent owner of 1,500 shares of the capital stock of the American Chicle Company, which was then quoted in the market at $225 per share. The defendant George H. Worthington borrowed this stock from the plaintiff, who was [144]*144a friend of himself and his family, for use as additional collateral security for an indebtedness that he had incurred, or was about to incur, to the Citizens Savings and Trust Company of Cleveland, Ohio. At the same time he gave the plaintiff his promisory note, payable at his office in Cleveland “ on or before two years from date,” for the amount of the then value of the stock, to wit, $337,500; and as security for the note he executed and delivered to the plaintiff a chattel mortgage upon his “ collection of postage stamps of the world contained in 60 volumes more or less, and known as the Worthington collection, at present stored in a room in the vault of the Cleveland Trust Company, and in the safe in room 612 Hickox Building, Cleveland, Ohio.” The note did not bear interest, but it was expressly agreed between the parties that in lieu of interest during the two years, if the note should be outstanding for that length of time, the plaintiff should receive the dividends on the stock as theretofore, and then amounting to eighteen per cent per annum; and that the stock should remain in the name of the plaintiff on the books of the Chicle Company. The defendant guaranteed the value of the stock at the amount of the note. In compliance with the request of the defendant, who stated to the plaintiff that the filing of the chattel mortgage would be an injury to his credit, it was not filed for record; and the stamps were not at that time removed into the possession of the plaintiff from the vault and safe where they had been deposited for safe keeping.

The Chicle stock was thereafter and on the 6th of May, 1915, sold by the bank to which it had been pledged by the defendant Worthington, and transferred out of the name of the plaintiff, so that she ceased to draw dividends upon it from that time.

[145]*145The defendant’s note was not paid at maturity, May 7, 1914; and the plaintiff did not get possession of the stamps until a later time, the deliveries of them to the plaintiff beginning September 25, 1914, and continuing until June 28, 1915, when the last delivery was made.

Between the 30th of July, 1915, and the 20th of October, 1916, the plaintiff received in monthly installments upon defendant’s indebtedness, either from the sale of stamps of the Worthington collection, or advancements thereon by an agent to whom some of the stamps were intrusted for sale, the aggregate sum of $25,500; but no other payments have been made to her upon the amount due on the note.

The defendant Worthington had been for a period of years possessed of large means, and engaged in important business enterprises which required the borrowing of large sums of money from banking institutions; and by July 30,1915, his indebtedness had become so great that he was financially embarrassed, and entered into an agreement with the defendants Warren S. Hayden, John F. Hagey and Wilber M. Baldwin, as a committee, the agreement reciting his inability to liquidate his indebtedness, and providing among other things that upon the request of the committee he would transfer to them or their nominees in trust all of his property and all income therefrom “ subject to any lien or encumbrance then existing,” for the purpose of paying his creditors; and providing further that the committee might require any part or all of the properties of the defendant to be transferred to a corporation to be organized by the committee, and that the committee might exercise through the medium of such corporation the powers delegated to it by said agreement; the agreement further providing that it [146]*146should not become operative and in force until a written declaration to that effect signed by the committee should be mailed to the defendant. On August 17, 1915, the agreement became operative by the service of such notice, and on the following day the defendant executed and delivered to the committee a specific assignment of his entire collection of postage stamps wherever located, but subject to whatever lien there is thereon upon the part of Alice P. Halladay,” the plaintiff. The provisions of the general assignment to the committee of July 30, 1915, had enumerated among the defendant’s assets “ stamps valued at one million dollars, pledged as collateral to a loan of 1,500 shares of American Chicle Company’s common stock to Mrs. Halladay of Buffalo. Par value of note $337,500.”

On September 27, 1915, a general assignment under the laws of the state of Ohio was made by the defendant Worthington to the defendant Harrison B, McGraw, of Cleveland, for the benefit of creditors of the defendant Worthington, which deed of general assignment was on that day duly filed in the Court of Insolvency in Cuyahoga county, Ohio.

No suits by creditors seeking money judgments were, or have been, instituted against the defendant in Ohio or elsewhere, nor has any judgment of any kind been obtained against him, and hé has not been thrown into bankruptcy under the National Bankruptcy Act.

The defendants other than George H. Worthington, in contesting the plaintiff’s claim to a prior lien upon the Worthington collection of stamps, urge that the plaintiff never owned the borrowed and pledged 1,500 shares of the capital stock of the American Chicle Company, and that they at all times belonged to the [147]*147defendant Worthington, his arrangement with the plaintiff in reference thereto being one which simply assured to the plaintiff the dividends upon the stock; and that therefore there was no consideration for the $337,500 note. It appears from the undisputed evidence that the plaintiff became the possessor of these shares of stock not later than the year 1901, and had received dividends upon them from that time until they were transferred to the Citizens Savings Bank upon their sale by the bank as a pledge for the indebtedness of the defendant Worthington; and a careful scrutiny of all of the transactions connected with the care, control and use of this stock from the time the plaintiff became the possessor of it in 1901, until it was sold as a pledge in 1915, fails to disclose any .evidence having any probative force whatever that the plaintiff was not herself the absolute owner of the stock, with the right to loan it to the defendant Worthington, as was done by her May 7,1912, and to receive for such loan the promissory note and chattel mortgage to secure the same, executed and delivered to the plaintiff by the defendant.

The defendants further urge that even if the plaintiff was the owner of the stock there were involved in the arrangement made by her with the defendant Worthington at the time of the taking of the note and chattel mortgage two factors, each of which constituted a fraud upon the defendant’s creditors, to wit, the plaintiff’s compliance with his request that the chattel mortgage should not he filed, and the retention by him of possession of the collection of postage stamps, after the mortgage upon it was executed and delivered.

It is also claimed by these defendants that there was an oral arrangement made in parol between the [148]

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Related

Halladay v. McGraw
118 Misc. 843 (New York Supreme Court, 1921)

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Bluebook (online)
99 Misc. 141, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/halladay-v-worthington-nysupct-1917.