Loring v. Brodie

134 Mass. 453, 1883 Mass. LEXIS 330
CourtMassachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
DecidedMarch 12, 1883
StatusPublished
Cited by61 cases

This text of 134 Mass. 453 (Loring v. Brodie) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Loring v. Brodie, 134 Mass. 453, 1883 Mass. LEXIS 330 (Mass. 1883).

Opinion

Devehs, J.

These are two bills in equity against George Brodie and the Merchants’ National Bank. They proceed against the defendant Brodie for breach of two different indentures of trust, and against the defendant bank as the recipient, with equitable notice of the existence of the trust, of certain portions of each trust estate, as collateral security for, or in payment of, debts due the bank from Brodie individually. These funds consisted of stocks and United States bonds, and also of cash, the proceeds of certain real property belonging to the second estate, sold by Brodie and paid to the bank.

The first bill seeks a conveyance from the defendant bank of six shares of the York Manufacturing Company, ten shares of [455]*455the Essex Manufacturing Company and ten shares of the Fitch-burg Railroad Company, alleged to have been held in trust for the plaintiffs, under an indenture of December 25, 1849.

The second bill seeks a conveyance from the defendant bank of eighty shares of the Fitchburg Railroad Company, twenty shares of the Essex Manufacturing Company and fifteen United States bonds of $1000 each, and also the restitution of certain moneys, being the proceeds of sales of real estate, which stocks, bonds, and real estate are alleged to have been held in trust for the plaintiffs, under an indenture of December 12, 1865.

Brodie has been defaulted, and, the bills against him being taken pro confessa, his liability for the misappropriation of the bonds, stocks and moneys is established.

The issue, so far as the responsibility of the bank is concerned, naturally divides itself into three inquiries: 1st, as to the United States bonds which were a portion of the trust property; 2d, as to the stocks; 3d, as to the moneys received from sales of real estate. Although there are two distinct trusts, it will not apparently be difficult to separate the property belonging to each, so as to render the appropriate decree in each case.

All the transactions as to the United States bonds terminated in a note, signed by Brodie as trustee, for the sum of $15,000, dated November 21, 1874, for which it was agreed between Brodie and the bank that the bonds should be held as security, and to the payment of which they were subsequently appropriated by the bank. It is to be considered whether they came into the possession of the bank under such circumstances as informed the bank, or fairly placed it on inquiry, as to whether it was dealing with trust property without proper regard to the rights of the beneficiaries. There were no United States bonds included in the first, or earlier trust; they formed a portion of the second. In order to ascertain the liability of the bank, it is necessary to examine the history of previous transactions as to the bonds, so far as it is disclosed by the evidence.

On December 20, 1865, J. K. Fuller was, and for a long time had been, the cashier of the defendant bank. He was appointed attorney by Brodie to collect the dividends on the stocks held by him as trustee, and a list was appended to the power, enumerating eighty shares of the Fitchburg Railroad Company, twenty [456]*456shares of the Essex Manufacturing Company, two shares of the Old Colony Railroad Company, and fifteen bonds of the United States for $1000 each. Fuller receipted to Brodie for the bonds for safe keeping, signing the receipt as cashier; and, throughout the transactions that took place, he acted, or assumed to act, for both Brodie and the bank.

A letter was written on April 27, 1867, by Fuller to Brodie, that the bank would make him a loan, but would require him to send a note as trustee specifying the bonds as security. This may fairly be deemed an official communication, on behalf of the bank, of the terms on which it would deal with him. Shortly after, a loan was made to him of $6000. All the notes were not given in evidence which are referred to in the accounts of the bank, but apparently from that time, during the cashiership of Fuller, Brodie as trustee was always indebted to the bank for loans secured by pledge of these bonds, as well as of other of the trust funds. Several notes were put in evidence from Brodie to the bank, in which the security was specified “ as a deposit of United States bonds,” and one note specifies the security as a deposit of United States bonds then on deposit in the bank. Of these notes the most important is that of September 13, 1869, for which the collateral security specified was “ 15 bonds of 1000 each, and 90 shares of Fitchburg R. R.”

Fuller left the b.ank on February 1, 1873. It is the contention of the defendant bank that, whatever the character of the transactions with Fuller, they were terminated; and that it was by a distinct transaction, which occurred after one Chapman became cashier, that these bonds became collateral security for the note, for payment of which, or for that of the note which was substituted therefor, they were eventually sold.

Before determining this fact, it will be well to inquire what the legal position of the parties to these notes was while Fuller was cashier. The plaintiffs contend that this note of September 13, 1869, was still in existence when Chapman became cashier, and was the foundation of the note of November 21, 1874, given subsequently to Chapman’s incumbency of the office, upon which the bonds were sold. If these bonds could not have been devoted by the bank to the payment of the note of September 13, 1869, on account of any notice under which the bank [457]*457received them, it is not of importance that the form of the note for which they were held as security was changed before this sale was made.

That Fuller knew that these bonds were trust property is quite clear. The schedules which were given him when he became the attorney of Brodie, and took them into his possession, specified them by numbers. He was distinctly referred to the trust deeds for the enumeration of these as well as the other property of the trust. As cashier, he had asked for a pledge of these bonds in reply to an application for a loan by Brodie. The notes of Brodie were signed by him as trustee, which afforded evidence that the bonds were trust property, especially as stocks which showed upon their face that they were trust property were united with them as collateral security. By law, the bank is entitled to exercise, by its board of directors, or duly authorized officers or agents, all such incidental powers as shall be necessary to carry on the business of banking. The cashier of a bank is its executive financial officer. It is under his direction that its moneys are received and paid out, that its debts are collected and paid, that its securities are kept and transferred. Such powers as are habitually exercised by cashiers must be held, so far as the public is concerned, to have been conferred upon Fuller by his election to the office. Merchants’ Bank v. State Bank, 10 Wall. 604. Whether he was or was not entitled, by authority of the bank, to make loans or discounts, or whether these were actually made by him, is not expressly shown; but, in any event, he was the officer to receive information and conduct the negotiation in regard to them with the bank, to pay out its moneys and receive the securities therefor. If he received the securities with a knowledge that they were wrongfully transferred, and were the property of others, his knowledge must affect the bank.

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Bluebook (online)
134 Mass. 453, 1883 Mass. LEXIS 330, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/loring-v-brodie-mass-1883.