Pinellas Central Bank & Trust Co. v. International Aerodyne, Inc.

233 So. 2d 872, 1970 Fla. App. LEXIS 6746
CourtDistrict Court of Appeal of Florida
DecidedApril 7, 1970
DocketNos. 69-6, 69-470
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 233 So. 2d 872 (Pinellas Central Bank & Trust Co. v. International Aerodyne, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court of Appeal of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pinellas Central Bank & Trust Co. v. International Aerodyne, Inc., 233 So. 2d 872, 1970 Fla. App. LEXIS 6746 (Fla. Ct. App. 1970).

Opinions

CARROLL, Judge.

Appeal No. 69-6 is by the plaintiff below, Pinellas Central Bank & Trust Company, herein referred to as the bank, from a judgment denying it recovery on a promissory note given to the bank by the appel-lee International Aerodyne, Inc., herein referred to as Aerodyne, dated September 1, 1965, in the amount of $95,040 as consideration for sale by the bank to Aerodyne on that date of a DC-7 aircraft, and holding Aerodyne had effectively rescinded that sale. Appeal No. 69-470 is by the defendant Aerodyne assigning as error the grant[874]*874ing of a partial summary judgment which was rendered against it on all but the first of six counts contained in its counterclaim as amended.

The background of the cause to which these two appeals relate, as disclosed in the record, was extensive and involved transactions spanning seven months. On May 4, 1965, Aerodyne entered into an agreement with Pasco Aviation, Inc., herein referred to as Pasco, for the sale to the latter of a Douglas DC-7 aircraft for a consideration of $115,000. The arrangement called for payment by Pasco to Aerodyne of the sum of $92,500 plus transfer of an Aerocom-mander aircraft, free of liens, which was considered to have a value of $22,500. On the date of that agreement, Pasco gave Aerodyne a bill of sale to the Aerocom-mander, which was recorded by Aerodyne on May 7, 1965, in the office of the federal agency designated for that purpose.

On the closing, which took place on May 11, 1965, the bank advanced to Aerodyne $85,000 of the purchase price for the DC-7 for the account of Pasco, for which the bank on that date received from Pasco a promissory note in the sum of $106,250, payable in sixty monthly installments of approximately $1,771 each. The amount of that note covered the $85,000 which had been advanced by the bank to Aerodyne for Pasco, plus interest thereon at 5% per annum for five years. At the same time Aerodyne made a conditional bill of sale of the DC-7 to Pasco. That instrument, as filled in by the bank, recited the sale price as $150,000. It acknowledged receipt by Aerodyne of $65,000 (thus reflecting an unpaid balance of $85,000). However, it referred to and was conditioned on payment of the note for $106,250, given to the bank by Pasco. Simultaneously, Aerodyne executed an assignment of the conditional sale contract to the bank, to serve as a first lien on the DC-7 as security to the bank for the repayment of the amount it had advanced, plus interest. On the same date, Pasco gave Aerodyne a note and mortgage on the DC-7, in the amount of $65,-000, which created a lien on the DC-7 in favor of Aerodyne, inferior to the lien of the bank as assignee of the sale contract. It was explained that the note and mortgage given by Pasco to Aerodyne was “interim security” for the latter pending the bank’s intended refinancement of the sale within 30 days, which refinancing never came about.

Several days after the closing, as a result of inquiries by Aerodyne, it was learned that the Aerocommander was subject to two encumbrances, one for $31,000 in favor of a third party, and one in the form of a chattel mortgage from Pasco to the bank in the amount of $46,421.50. Thereupon, Aerodyne informed Pasco that it would reject the Aerocommander as part, of the purchase price unless cleared of liens within 30 days; otherwise the price was $115,000. The liens were not removed from the Aerocommander. No return bill of sale thereon appears to have been made by Aerodyne to Pasco, and later, in August of 1965, the bank repossessed the Aerocom-mander for default in the chattel mortgage which it held thereon.

Upon rejection by Aerodyne of the Aero-commander as part of the purchase price of the DC-7, a balance of $30,000 was owing to Aerodyne from Pasco, representing the difference between the purchase price of $115,000 and the $85,000 received by Aerodyne from the bank, plus $10,000 which Aerodyne had loaned Pasco on or about the date of closing, making a total of $40,000 payable to Aerodyne by Pasco. Aerodyne held and retained the $65,000 note which it had received from Pasco at the time of closing, with the (second) mortgage on the DC-7 given to secure said note.

On May 28, 1965, Aerodyne, through its attorneys, wrote the bank objecting to the amounts which the bank had inserted in the conditional sale contract, complaining that Aerodyne’s second mortgage security was prejudiced thereby. On June 7, 1965, the bank, through its attorneys, replied by let[875]*875ter that the conditional sale contract, as drawn, accomplished what Aerodyne had desired by furnishing security to the bank for repayment of the portion of the purchase price of the DC-7 which the bank had advanced, and in that letter the bank agreed it would not sell or assign the conditional sale contract unless the balance due from Pasco to Aerodyne was paid, and agreed that if it should repossess the DC-7 from Pasco it would permit Aerodyne to repurchase the aircraft for the balance of the principal and interest due the bank at the time of repossession, plus the repossession expense.

By August of 1965, Pasco had become in default in its payments on the aforesaid notes to the bank and to Aerodyne. At that time the DC-7 was known to be based in Luxembourg in the custody of Interocean Airways, the bailee of Pasco. Interocean had been operating the DC-7 on charter in Europe. Aerodyne had a representative in Copenhagen, Denmark, a vice-president of the company named Holbert.

During the early part of August 1965, a series of conferences were held by representatives of Aerodyne and of the bank, by telephone and in a meeting, as to ways and means for collecting the amounts owed them by Pasco. According to testimony of the president of Aerodyne, those conferences included discussion of the possibility of Aerodyne repurchasing the DC-7 from the bank for the amount due the bank for its advance thereon; that Aero-dyne instructed its European representative Holbert “to check into the condition of the aircraft; where it was and what could be done with it;” that Holbert reported There was a possibility we could put it to work in Europe.” Following those preliminary discussions the bank obtained a bill of sale of the DC-7 from Pasco, on August 13, 1965. Thereupon Aerodyne, through its president and Holbert, made contact with a prospective purchaser of the aircraft and with a prospective lessee thereof, of Copenhagen, but no sale or lease of the DC-7 to such parties was effected.

On September 1, 1965, a further meeting was held between representatives of Aero-dyne and the bank, as a result of which Aerodyne repurchased the DC-7 from the bank. A bill of sale to the aircraft, bearing that date, was made and delivered by the bank to Aerodyne, and on the same date, in payment for the DC-7, Aerodyne gave the bank its promissory note, payable in 36 monthly installments of $2,640 each, and a chattel mortgage on the DC-7 as security therefor, in the sum of $95,040, representing the amount due the bank for repayment of its initial advance of $85,000 plus interest thereon for the period of the note. The arrangement for that resale by the bank to Aerodyne on September 1, 1965,. called for delivery of the aircraft to Aero-dyne in Luxembourg free and clear of encumbrances other than the lien thereon represented by the May 11 conditional sale contract.

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Bluebook (online)
233 So. 2d 872, 1970 Fla. App. LEXIS 6746, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pinellas-central-bank-trust-co-v-international-aerodyne-inc-fladistctapp-1970.