Leslie v. Hammond

1935 OK 981, 50 P.2d 321, 174 Okla. 212, 1935 Okla. LEXIS 1429
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedOctober 15, 1935
DocketNo. 25673.
StatusPublished

This text of 1935 OK 981 (Leslie v. Hammond) 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
Leslie v. Hammond, 1935 OK 981, 50 P.2d 321, 174 Okla. 212, 1935 Okla. LEXIS 1429 (Okla. 1935).

Opinion

PER CURIAM.

This appeal is the result of an action by Ray O. Davis, as next friend of Byron W. Payton, Jr., and Thelma Hammond, minors, against S. B. Leslie to recover an undivided four-ninths interest in 160 acres of land, more or less, and to quiet title to the same; and a suit by S. B. Leslie against Ray C. Davis, Mattie Payton Davis, and the latter’s two children by a former marriage, Bryon W. Payton, Jr., and Thelma Hammond, in ejectment and to quiet title to all of said land. The two cases were consolidated.

The facts are that Byron W. Payton died intestate in August, 1914, at which time he was the owner and in possession of certain real estate situated in Okmulgee county, which at the time of his death was encumbered with mortgages. The property was inherited by his widow, Mattie Payton, and three minor children, Wahneta Payton, now Trindle, Thelma Payton, now Hammond, and Bryon W. Payton, Jr.

These mortgages became due about December-1, 1922. The holders of the mortgages demanded payment and threatened to foreclose the mortgages. To avoid foreclosure of the mortgages, the widow, who had remarried, and whose name was Mattie Pay-ton Davis, 'and her husband, Ray C. Davis, and Wahneta Trindle, as adults, and Mattie Payton Davis, as guardian of her two minor children, Thelma Payton, now Hammond, and Byron W. Payton, Jr., borrowed from the Commerce Trust Company of Kansas City, Mo., a sum sufficient to pay the amount then due on the old mortgages, taxes, and expenses incidental to the completion of the loan.

These parties executed notes to the Commerce Trust Company to the extent 'of $2,640, by one note for $2,200, due January 1, 1933. and a second note for $440, payable in five annual installments of $88 each. These notes were secured by two mortgages in the respective amounts'. The county court of Ok-mulgee county directed the execution and delivery of the notes and mortgages.

On February 17, 1926, Mattie Payton Davis and her husband, Ray O. Davis, and Wahneta Trindle, as adults, and Mattie Payton Davis, as guardian of Thelma Payton, now Hammond, and Byron W. Payton, Jr., executed and delivered to the plaintiff in error, S. B. Leslie, their note in the sum of $400, secured by a mortgage due December 11, 1926, and covering the real estate in question. On October 11, 1927, the guardian petitioned for approval of this real estate mortgage in the county court of Okmulgee county, alleging the amount was used for the purpose of paying delinquent taxes on the real estate, and that the real estate was about to be sold for taxes, and an order was made on that date ratifying and confirming the execution of said note and mortgage.

On March 18, 1927, the Commerce Trust Company filed suit for the foreclosure of its second mortgage in the sum of $440, for failure to pay the installments thereof, and for failure to pay interest installments on the first mortgage and delinquent taxes, and prayed for a judgment against Mattie Pay-ton Davis and against the other parties executing said notes and mortgages for the sum of $882.66; with interest and attorney fees, and for foreclosure of the said second mortgage.

In this action the plaintiff in error, S. B. Leslie, was a defendant by reason of his mortgage, and in this action S. B. Leslie set up his mortgage. Judgment was rendered therein on March 24, 19:28, in favor of the Commerce Trust Company for the sum of $882.62, with interest at 8 per cent, from May 15, 1927, and for the sum of $87.26 attorney fees, and the same was decreed a lien on the real estate 'and premises, subject only to the first mortgage of Commerce Trust Company. Judgment was also rendered in favor of S. B. Leslie and against said defendants in the sum of $481.94, wth interest at 10 per cent, from March 24, 1928, 'and the further sum of $58.20 attorney fees, and the same was declared a lien on said real estate and premises, subject to the liens of the Commerce Trust Company, and for foreclosure of said liens. Thereafter execution was issued of praecipe filed by the Commerce Trust Company, and the property advertised and sold at sheriff’s sale to S. B. Leslie for the sum of $1.200, the sale confirmed and sheriff’s deed was executed and delivered to S. B. Leslie on the 14th day of November, 1928.

The defendants remained on the property until January of 1932, and when the defendants refused to deliver possession, the plaintiff in error, S. B. Leslie, brought his action in ejectment.

*214 The defendants in error had previously brought action for recovery of their undivided four-ninths interest and cancellation of said sheriff's deed and proceedings preceding the same, and declaring said notes and mortgages, foreclosed null and void.

Upon trial of said consolidated cases, judgment was rendered on December 22, 1933, in favor of Thelma Hammond and Byron W. Payton, Jr., and against the plaintiff in error, S. B. Leslie, vacating, canceling, and holding for naught the mortgages and notes previously sued upon and foreclosed and sheriff’s deed previously issued and all orders, judgments, and decrees preceding the execution and delivery of the same in so far as the same divested the interest of Thelma Hammond and Byron AY. Payton, Jr., of their undivided four-ninths interest in and to said property and quieting their title to the same.

Judgment was further rendered in favor of the plaintiff in error, S. B. Leslie, to the extent of an undivided five-ninths interest in said property, and awarded possession of the same as a tenant in common with Thelma Hammond and Byron W. Payton, Jr., From that part of the judgment adverse to him, the plaintiff in error has appealed by proper proceedings to this court.

The propositions of law presented for the necessary determination of this matter will now be considered.

There is first presented for our determination the question as to whether or not the title to this property being vested in the mother and children, a county court had authority to approve a mortgage upon the individual minors’ share of said property to the full amount secured by said mortgage; the contention being that one minor’s share in the property should not be pledged for the entire debt, and that the county court could only authorize a mortgage upon the minor’s property equal to the proportionate share owned by the minor.

Section 1267, O. g. 1931 (section 1260, C. O. S. 1921), governs the authority to mortgage a ward’s property, the pertinent portion of which reads:

“The county judge may, * * * by an order, grant authority to * * * the guardians of the estates of minors * * * to execute a new mortgage for the purpose of paying off and securing the release of any * * * mortgage or lien. * * *”

The appellee cites and relies upon the case of Fowler v. Humphrey Investment Co., 142 Okla. 221, 286 P. 867, and contends that that case is decisive of this question. In that ease was cited Howard v. Bryan, 133 Cal. 257, 65 P. 462. An examination of these cases discloses that the facts in each are not of sufficient similarity as to be controlling in the decision of this case under the facts as hereinabove set out. In each of these cases the mortgages authorized to be made were in excess of the indebtedness then upon the property and included personal indebtedness of the guardian.

In a recent case decided by this court, In re Campbell’s Guardianship, 169 Okla. 47, 35 P.

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Related

Howard v. Bryan
65 P. 462 (California Supreme Court, 1901)
Glover v. Warner
1929 OK 79 (Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 1929)
In Re Campbell's Guardianship
1934 OK 420 (Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 1934)
Fowler v. Humphrey Inv. Co.
1930 OK 98 (Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 1930)
First National Bank v. Bangs
136 P. 915 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1913)

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Bluebook (online)
1935 OK 981, 50 P.2d 321, 174 Okla. 212, 1935 Okla. LEXIS 1429, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/leslie-v-hammond-okla-1935.