Mercantile Trust Co. v. Kanawha & O. Ry. Co.

50 F. 874, 7 Ohio F. Dec. 205, 1892 U.S. App. LEXIS 1789
U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Southern Ohio·Decided June 3, 1892·No. No. 479·Published

Opinion

Sage, District Judge.

This cause is before the court upon the intervening petition of the Adams Express Company and the proofs and exhibits offered by the parties. It is set up in the petition that in 1888 the Ohio Central Railroad Company was the owner and in possession of the railroad involved in this suit, the river division of which extends from the town of Corning, in the state of Ohio, to a point in the county [875] of Gallia, on the north side of the Ohio river, and thence, crossing the river by bridge, to the city of Charleston, W. Va., as mentioned and described in the bill of complaint herein, and had duly executed a mortgage thereon to the Central 'Trust Company of New York, to secure its bonds to the amount of ⅜5,316,000. On the 20th of November, 1888, the Central Trust Company filed its bill in equity to foreclose said mortgage in the circuit court of the United States for the district of West Virginia, arid on the 21st of November, 1883, upon the application of the Central Trust Company, and with the consent of all parties, the court appointed Thomas R. Sharp receiver of said railroad, with power to operate and manage the same, lie accepted the appointment, and entered upon the performance of the duties of the position. On the 13th of December, 1883, the court made an order authorizing the receiver to issue certificates to an amount not exceeding $50,000, bearing interest at the rate of (> per cent, per annum; the court finding that that amount would be required for the repairing of bridges and ditching and ballasting certain portions of the roadbed, and for certain other expenses of maintenance, repairing, and management. It was further ordered that the certificates should be a first and paramount lion on the property of the railroad company then in the possession of the receiver, and upon that which ho might afterwards'take into his possession. Said certificates were not to be negotiated at less than their face value, and it was further ordered that the receiver should pay thorn out of the revenues of the railroad company received by him from lime to time.

On the 21th of March, 1884, the court entered a further order, authorizing the receiver to sell or negotiate certificates upon such terms and at such rates as he might doom proper, and might be able to obtain.

It is further set forth that the petitioner, on the faith of those orders, both of which remain in full force and are unreversed, and in consideration of receiver’s certificates delivered to it by said Thomas R. Sharp, paid to him at various dales beginning April 16, 1884, and ending August 2D, 1881, $35,935.39, taking therefor certificates at par. A decree of foreclosure was subsequently entered under which the railroad was sold to a committee of the bondholders under said mortgage, who turned in their bonds in payment of all but a small portion of the purchase price, and thereupon organized the defendant corporation, the Kanawha A Ohio Railway Company, executed the mortgage sought to bo foreclosed herein, and distributed the stock of said Kanawha & Ohio Railway Company," and the bonds secured by said mortgage, pro rata among the owners and holders of the bonds secured by said mortgage of the Ohio Central Railroad Company and said Central Trust Company; and that the stock and mortgage bonds of the Kanawha <& Ohio Railway. Company are still almost wholly, if not altogether, held by said original distributees.

The petitioner further sots forth that no provision was made in the proceedings in the United States circuit court for the district of West Virginia for the payment of the receiver’s certificates issued to and held by petitioner, and that the same are wholly unpaid and due to petitioner [876] with interest; also that no notice was ever given to petitioner to present the same for payment. Wherefore petitioner prays that said certificates may be declared a first and paramount lien upon so much of said realty as is in the state of West Virginia, and that out of the proceeds thereof it may he first paid the amount of said certificates, with interest.

The following are by stipulation admitted to be facts:

(1) That on the faith of the orders of December 13, 1883, and March 24, 1884, .mentioned in the intervening petition, and in consideration of receiver’s certificates simultaneously delivered to it by said Sharp, the Adams Express Company paid to said Sharp, receiver, the sums stated upon the days stated in the intervening petition; the receiver’s certificates being in form as shown therein.

(2) That none of the money so as aforesaid paid to said Sharp by the Adams Express Company was used for the purposes specified in said order of December 13, 1883, or for any other purposes of said receivership, or for the benefit of the property held therein or of the parties to said cause.

(3) .That neither the purchasers, nor their grantee, nor the Kanawha & Ohio Railway Company, nor the complainant herein, knew of the existence of said certificates until September, 1887; and that the Adams Express Company never demanded of the Kanawha & Ohio Railway Company payment of said certificates, nor ever in any way, until the filing of its intervening petition herein, sought to enforce the alleged lien which it •now asserts. Said certificates have never been paid, nor the money represented thereby.

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Mercantile Trust Co. v. Kanawha & O. Ry. Co., 50 F. 874, 7 Ohio F. Dec. 205, 1892 U.S. App. LEXIS 1789 (circtsdoh 1892).

50 F. 874 (Mercantile Trust Co. v. Kanawha & O. Ry. Co.) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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