In Re Gregory

2004 OK 57, 97 P.3d 639, 2001 WL 34609362
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedJuly 6, 2001
Docket97,741
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 2004 OK 57 (In Re Gregory) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In Re Gregory, 2004 OK 57, 97 P.3d 639, 2001 WL 34609362 (Okla. 2001).

Opinion

97 P.3d 639 (2001)
2004 OK 57

In re George Lee GREGORY and Billie Ruth Gregory, Debtors.
Susan Manchester, Trustee, Plaintiff,
v.
Green Tree Financial Servicing Corporation and Conseco Finance Servicing Corporation, Defendants.

No. 97,741.

Supreme Court of Oklahoma.

July 6, 2001.

Susan Manchester of Taylor & Manchester, Oklahoma City, OK, for Plaintiff.

Sandy L. Schovanec of Phillips McFall McCaffrey McVay & Murrah, P.C., Oklahoma *640 City, OK, for Defendant Conseco Finance Servicing Corporation.

Jennifer H. Kirkpatrick of Phillips McFall McCaffrey McVay & Murrah, P.C., Oklahoma City, OK, for Green Tree Servicing, L.L.C., substituted successor Defendant to Conseco Finance Servicing Corporation.

LAVENDER, J.

¶ 1 This Court has been presented with a question of law certified from the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Oklahoma, Judge Richard L. Bohanon, pursuant to the Revised Uniform Certification of Questions of Law Act, 20 O.S.2001, § 1601 et seq., to wit:

[u]nder Oklahoma law, did the [d]efendants, who are creditors of the [d]ebtors, fail to properly perfect their security interest in the [d]ebtors' mobile home when they filed a lien entry form and application for a certificate of title containing the incorrect vehicle identification number (hereinafter "VIN") and where the VIN [ ] was incorrect by only one digit?

Our answer to the question is as follows:

if the existence of the lien was not readily ascertainable from a reasonably diligent/prudent search of the Oklahoma Tax Commission (OTC) records as a result of the creditor's one digit error in the vehicle's VIN on a lien entry form and application for a certificate of title submitted to the OTC or one of its motor license agents because it is assumed the applicable vehicle lien records of the OTC were filed/indexed solely according to a vehicle's VIN at the time of submission, the creditor's security interest in the vehicle would not be deemed properly perfected under Oklahoma law.

PART I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY.[1]

¶ 2 The debtors, George Lee Gregory and Billie Ruth Gregory, purchased a 1997 Cavalier Mobile Home from Sunbelt Homes. The correct vehicle identification number (VIN) of the mobile home is: ALCA0696680S 40117. (Bolding and underlining added.)[2] Defendant, Green Tree Financial Servicing Corporation (Green Tree Corp.) is the assignee and holder in due course of the promissory note, security agreement and disclosure statement signed by the debtors and Sunbelt. Defendant, Conseco Finance Servicing *641 Corporation (Conseco) is Green Tree Corp.'s successor in interest. Plaintiff, Susan Manchester, is the trustee in the debtors' Chapter 7 bankruptcy case.

¶ 3 The instant case has been subject to a stay order since March 2003, said Order issued by the Chief Justice, after this Court was notified by Conseco's March 11, 2003 filing that it had itself filed for bankruptcy protection in the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. Although the stay remains in effect as to Conseco, the stay was dissolved in other respects by the Chief Justice's Order of June 9, 2004 after the Court was informed by filings herein that, consistent with developments in Conseco's Illinois bankruptcy, the bankruptcy judge in the Gregory Western District of Oklahoma bankruptcy had substituted an entity named Green Tree Servicing, L.L.C. (Green Tree, L.L.C.) as successor defendant to Conseco in the Gregory Oklahoma bankruptcy. In June 2004 Green Tree, L.L.C. formerly adopted as its own the brief in chief of Conseco previously filed with this Court and the matter is, thus, now ripe for decision. We also note, at places in this opinion we continue to refer to Conseco, notwithstanding our recognition that Green Tree, L.L.C. has been substituted as defendant for Conseco in the Western District of Oklahoma federal bankruptcy proceeding.[3]

¶ 4 On or about July 3, 1996 Green Tree Corp. submitted three documents to and had them filed with an Oklahoma motor license agent in regard to perfecting a security interest in the mobile home and generating a certificate of title for it. The documents were: (1) a lien entry form showing the VIN for the mobile home as ALCA06966805 40117; (2) an application for an Oklahoma certificate of title for a vehicle (i.e., the mobile home) showing the VIN as ALCA06966805 40117; and (3) a manufacturer's statement or certificate of origin to a manufactured home (i.e., the mobile home) showing the VIN as ALCA0696680S 40117. (Bolding and underlining added.) Obviously, (1) and (2) showed wrong VINs and (3) showed the correct VIN.

¶ 5 Also, separate lien and title receipts issued on or about July 3, 1996. Both the lien receipt and the title receipt, on their faces, show VINs. The lien receipt VIN matched the incorrect one contained on (1) and (2) above. The title receipt had the correct VIN. Furthermore, the lien receipt had a receipt number on it, to wit: XXXXXXXXXA7962. (Bolding and underlining added.) The title receipt had a receipt number on it, XXXXXXXXXA7967 (bolding and underlining added), that did not match the lien receipt number, but did match a number shown on the actual certificate of title that issued. The title receipt did not reflect any lien.[4]

¶ 6 Subsequently, debtors filed their Chapter 7 bankruptcy petition in April 2001. At the time debtors filed for bankruptcy, the certificate of title that had been issued for the mobile home did not show a lien in favor of Green Tree Corp. or Conseco, or, for that matter, a lien at all. Further, the certificate of title had the correct VIN on it, apparently, the source document used for its preparation being the manufacturer's statement or certificate of origin to a manufactured home (i.e., the involved mobile home), said document being the one submitted to the agent by Green Tree Corp. in July 1996 that did contain the correct VIN.

*642 ¶ 7 On or about September 14, 2001 — i.e., after debtors filed for bankruptcy — a corrected lien form was filed (i.e., one containing the correct VIN) and a new lien receipt issued. Both of said documents (on their faces) appear to be an attempt to relate the effectiveness of the lien back to the July 1996 date that Green Tree Corp. initially submitted a lien entry form to the motor license agent with an incorrect VIN.[5]

¶ 8 In the Oklahoma federal bankruptcy proceeding the trustee and Conseco both moved for summary judgment. The federal court concluded it was necessary to have this Court answer the certified question in order to properly determine whether the trustee or Conseco is entitled to summary judgment. In essence, the trustee asserts the one digit error in the VIN renders Conseco's security interest unperfected because another creditor would have had no notice of the lien in that the pertinent title and lien documents are indexed by OTC by VIN instead of by the name of the debtor and, thus, a reasonably diligent/prudent search of the OTC records would not reveal the existence of the lien. Conseco, in effect, asserts the one digit error is minor, that substantial compliance with necessary filing requirements to perfect the security interest occurred, and it was the duty of the license agent to have caught the error in the VIN.

PART II. ANALYSIS.

¶ 9 Title 47 O.S.Supp.1995, § 1110(A)(1), (2) and (7), concern perfection of a security interest in a vehicle. Those subsections provided in pertinent part as follows:

A. 1.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
2004 OK 57, 97 P.3d 639, 2001 WL 34609362, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-gregory-okla-2001.