M. F. A. Cooperative Ass'n of Mansfield v. Murray

365 S.W.2d 279, 1963 Mo. App. LEXIS 569
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedMarch 1, 1963
Docket8119
StatusPublished
Cited by26 cases

This text of 365 S.W.2d 279 (M. F. A. Cooperative Ass'n of Mansfield v. Murray) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
M. F. A. Cooperative Ass'n of Mansfield v. Murray, 365 S.W.2d 279, 1963 Mo. App. LEXIS 569 (Mo. Ct. App. 1963).

Opinion

STONE, Judge.

This is a replevin action, in which M. F. A. Cooperative Association of Mansfield, Missouri (hereinafter referred to as plaintiff) appeals from an adverse judgment (a) directing the return to Bill Murray and Floyd Lawson (hereinafter referred to as defendants) of a 1955 Fruehauf refrigerated trailer, Serial No. AV-198283 (hereinafter sometimes referred to as the trailer) and (b) adjudging that defendants recover from plaintiff $1,500 for loss of use of the trailer together with costs. An approved bond having been given by plaintiff [Rules *282 99.03 and 99.04; Secs. 533.030 and 533.040] 1 when suit was instituted on May 3, 1960, the sheriff took the trailer the following day and delivered it to plaintiff, who still has possession of it by virtue of the filing and approval of a supersedeas bond. Rule 82.-09.

During the first half of 1959, defendants, operating out of Crane, Missouri, as partners under the firm name of Lawson and Murray, were engaged in hauling live chickens to the Clinton, Missouri, processing plant of Anderson-Haley Poultry Company (hereinafter referred to as Anderson-Haley), to whom a Missouri certificate of incorporation had been issued on January 14, 1959. Defendants “bought some” of the poultry themselves and “hauled some for other people.” For the poultry delivered to its Clinton plant, Anderson-Haley was to pay the “market price” plus 1½{⅛ per pound for hauling. Defendants were to collect the sale price of the chickens hauled for others and were “to pay those other people” for their poultry. At first, Anderson-Haley usually paid defendants within two or three days after delivery of chickens to the Clinton plant. However, as time passed, the indebtedness of Anderson-Haley to defendants mounted steadily so that,, by June 22, 1959, that,indebtedness was (as defendants testified) “a little less than $65,000 " In these circumstances, defendants sought and obtained “some security from (Anderson-Haley) for this indebtedness” in the form of a negotiable promissory note in the principal sum of $100,000, dated June 22, 1959, payable in monthly installments of $1,000 each, and secured by deed of trust of even date (hereinafter referred to as the deed of trust of June 22) which covered Anderson-Haley’s processing plant at Clinton, including “all plant machinery and equipment * * * which are permanent fixtures.” This deed of trust was, on the same day, filed for record in the office of the Recorder of Deeds of Henry County, Missouri. We note parenthetically defendants’ trial explanation of the $100,000 principal sum in the note of June 22, to wit, that, although Anderson-Haley’s processing plant was not operating then, Frank M. Haley (identified as president of Anderson-Haley) “was figuring on starting up again and we wanted enough of those assets to assure us (defendants) of our money” — “we didn’t know how much poultry they (Anderson-Haley) would let us haul in there to them” in the future.

On August 7, 1959, plaintiff sold and delivered two loads of broilers to Anderson-Haley at Clinton, for which check “was supposed to issue ⅜ * * within the next day or two.” No remittance having been received in the meantime, plaintiff’s manager Tripp went to Clinton on September 22, 1959, found that Anderson-Haley’s plant was not operating, and after talking with Haley examined the recorded deed of trust of June 22. On the day following his trip to Clinton, to wit, on September 23, 1959, Tripp went to the office of attorneys (herein identified as M & P) in a city (not Springfield) within the same general area as Crane. When asked why he had contacted those attorneys, Tripp said that he had understood that they represented defendants “who were having trouble on their claims” and that they (M & P) “could and would help me.” According to Tripp (neither M nor P testified), he told P on September 23 that he (Tripp) had found of recr ord in Henry County the deed of trust of June 22 and “that with this four-month period facing me, I would have to force them (Anderson-Haley) into bankruptcy, 2 *283 ■and he (P) advised me that if I ‘would not rock the boat, they (M & P) would contact Haley and get something worked out, and I told him (P) then that I would wait a day or two.”

On September 25, 1959, P called Tripp over long distance and “wanted to know if I (Tripp) had made up my mind about starting bankruptcy proceedings against Anderson-Haley,” to which Tripp replied that “by five o’clock I would give him my answer as to whether (plaintiff) was going to start the bankruptcy proceedings or let them (M & P) try to get us some security and work it out.” On the same day, Tripp conferred with and employed attorneys in Springfield (herein identified as W & E), who thereafter represented plaintiff in protracted negotiations with M & P. The positive and undisputed testimony of Tripp and of attorneys W & E was that attorneys M & P said, from time to time, that they were representing defendants and had conferred with their clients on several occasions concerning the matters under discussion. Since the relationship of attorney and client is essentially one of agency [Henderson v. Cape Trading Co., 316 Mo. 384, 392, 289 S.W. 332, 334 (9)], it is recognized that neither the agency of attorneys M & P nor the scope of their authority could be established by their unsworn statements. See cases collected in 23A West’s Missouri Digest under Principal and Agent,. However, grudging admissions wrung from defendants themselves were sufficient, we think, to have permitted a finding that, at all times and in all things here material, M & P were acting as defendants’ agents and attorneys and within the scope of their authority as such.

During the period from September 25 .to October 21, 1959, there was a running exchange of long distance telephone calls between plaintiff’s attorneys W & E and defendants’ attorneys M & P. These discussions obviously proceeded upon the accepted premise tha,t an effective , involuntary petition in bankruptcy could be filed against Anderson-Haley [11 U.S.C.A. § 95]; that such petition would be filed on or before October 21, 1959, unless in the meantime Anderson-Haley’s indebtedness to plaintiff was secured adequately; and that, if Anderson-Haley were adjudicated a bankrupt, the lien of the deed of trust of June 22 would be avoided and defendants thereby would be reduced to the status of common, unsecured creditors. In the initial conversation between plaintiff’s attorney W and defendants’ attorney M on September 25, M commented that bankruptcy should be avoided. W agreed but insisted that plaintiff “wanted its money the same as (defendants) wanted their money.” Whereupon, M “said that there was no money, no cash, but that he believed he could find some equipment as security for our client (plaintiff) if we would give him a reasonable length of time to work it out.”

On September 29, plaintiff’s attorney E talked with defendants’ attorney M, who stated that defendants “had two trailers and one tractor down at Crane that had been transferred from Clinton to Crane” and that “an arrangement could be worked out and security could be given” for Anderson-Haley’s indebtedness to plaintiff. E asked for a note secured by chattel mortgage on the tractor and one of the trailers.

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365 S.W.2d 279, 1963 Mo. App. LEXIS 569, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/m-f-a-cooperative-assn-of-mansfield-v-murray-moctapp-1963.