Potter v. Bond

1924 OK 340, 224 P. 537, 98 Okla. 135, 1924 Okla. LEXIS 1165
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedMarch 18, 1924
Docket13506
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 1924 OK 340 (Potter v. Bond) 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
Potter v. Bond, 1924 OK 340, 224 P. 537, 98 Okla. 135, 1924 Okla. LEXIS 1165 (Okla. 1924).

Opinion

Opinion by

THREADGILL, C.

This is an appeal from the district court of Muskogee county, and the plaintiff in error was defendant and defendant in error was plaintiff in the court below, and for convenience will be referred to here as they were there. The plaintiff brought suit against the defendant for damages which he claimed he was entitled to by reason of the fraud and deceit practiced on him by the defendant’s false representations, causing him to execute a written contract and his notes for $15,000, in the purchase of a half interest in a lumber company in Muskogee county, Okla., with the lumber plant at Heavener, Okla.

Plaintiff claimed that in September, 1920, the defendant misrepresented to him that he was the owner of the Potter Lumber & Supply Company, and that he had assets in the sum of $30,000, consisting of an indebtedness due him from the Brown Manufacturing Company, in the sum of $13,600, and a timber lease from Charles F. J- and O, C. Buschow worth $3,500, and a lumber plant in LePlore county, consisting of buildings, improvements, and machinery, saw mills, planer, 'Office building, five cottages, one barn, a planing mill, shed and approaches, and all necessary equipment for a saw mill, located in the timber about 7 miles from Heavener, and an office at Heavener, and books and furniture located in a room in 401 Barnes Building, Muskogee, and “other personal property” worth $2,670.50; and ho represented that all 'of this property was worth $30,000, and proposed to the plaintiff that they would organize a company that would be known as the Louisiana Lumber Company; and the plaintiff to pay $15,000 for a half interest in the capital stock and the defendant was to have the other $15,000' of said stock, and that said company was organized and plaintiff entered into a written contract with the defendant in which these terms were agreed upon, and the plaintiff executed his notes, relying upon the representations as to the value of the property above stated, and that the defendant knowingly misrepresented the value of the indebtedness in the sum of $13,600 from the Brown Manufacturing Company, when he knew it was not worth that much, and as a matter of fact was only worth $7,583.51, and that the timber lease that the defendant represented to be worth $3,500 was worth nothing, and the “other personal property”, the items of which were not given, which the defendant stated was $2,670.50, was fictitious and represented no property and no value, and that he was thus induced to invest $15,-000 in the company, relying upon the representations of the defendant, and to his damage in the sum of $5,693.24. The defendant demurred to the plaintiff’s second amended petition on the ground that it did not state facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action in favor of plaintiff and against the defendant, which being overruled by the court, the defendant filed his answer consisting, first, of a general denial, and, second, that the contract that plaintiff and defendant entered into was for the befiefit of the Potter Lumber & Supply Company,- and that plaintiff bought his interest *136 in the Louisiana Lumber Company, a corporation, in a separate and distinct transaction from the one in which the contract mentioned by plaintiff was entered into, and even if the plaintiff was defrauded it was not in connection with his transaction in buying stock in the Louisiana Lumber Company, but he denies the allegations of false representations and fraud. Defendant pleads further that in making the written contract with the plaintiff that he was acting as agent for the Potter Lumber & Supply Company, a corporation, and that that contract was between the plaintiff and the Potter Lumber & Supply Company, so far as the transfer of the property upon account 'Of which plaintiff complains of being swindled is concerned. Defendant states, further, that the plaintiff expressed himself as being dissatisfied with the contract and transaction and to satisfy him, as the agent for the said Lumber & Supply Company, he returned to the defendant one of his notes for $2,500, which had been given for the purchase price of said'property, and which was a part of the $15,000, and the plaintiff accepted the return of this note in full satisfaction of all claims upon account of which he is now prosecuting his action. Defendant further pleads that the plaintiff was a , banker, a lumber man, and a shrewd business man, and that he had ample opportunity to examine all the property and details entering into the transaction before he invested and entered into the written contract with the defendant, and if the property was not worth as much after the plaintiff’s investment, it was because of the general depression that prevailed in the lumber business and every other sort of busines throughout the country. The plaintiff filed a reply which consisted of a general denial. The issues were tried to a jury December 7, 1921, and resulted in a verdict and judgment in. favor of the plaintiff in the sum of $1,000, and the defendant has appealed and states 10 assignments of error.

1. The principal errors complained of by the defendant relate to the sufficiency of the evidence and the instructions of the court. The plaintiff’s testimony is the • principal evidence showing the issues in the case, the greater part of which is as follows :

“A. Mr. Potter proposed that I enter into a business with him and that we organize a company, lumber company for $30,000, that he take half the stock and I take half and he would turn over the assets he had at Heavener, Okla., to me and I should p'ay $15,000 for half -of this stock. Q. Did he state of what the assets consisted at that time? A. He did. Q. Of what did he state? A. He said the land, buildings, machinery he owned and — . Q. At Heavener? A. At Heavener, valued at $10,000. Q. $10,000? A. Yes, and that he had assigned contract he had for timber known as the Buschow Contract for $3,500 and that office furniture at Muskogee and some little furniture he had in the office at Heavener valued at $262.50 and other properties $2,367.50 and a prior account that was due from the Brown Manufacturing Company, $13,600; these separate items together totalled $30,000 and he would turn it in for $30,000. Q. Had you information the Buschow contract was what it was said? A. The Buschow contract was a contract he had with Buschow for something like 6,000,000 feet of standing timber, he had a contract for $3.50 a thousand and to pay for it as you cut it and that he had paid on that contract, advance payment of $3,500 and this was the value he placed on the contract. Q. You may state whether or not at that time you could take all the timber? A. Said he had a.contract for this timber at $63.50 a thousand after you cut it. Q. You see the contract at that time? A. I did not. Q. Had you any information with reference to the contract other than the information received by you from the statements of Mr. Potter? A. I had not. Q. At the time had you seen the Brown contract? A. X had not. Q. Had you seen anything with reference to the Brown account other than what you learned from Mr. Potter? A. Mr. Potter’s word only. Q. Did you explain it to Mr. Potter? A. I certainly did. Q. Did you know at that time of what the other property consisted? A. I did not. Q. Did you have any information with reference to other personal property other than what Potter gave out? A. None, whatever. Q. You after that see Mr. Potter? A. I did. Q. Where? A. Mi-. Potter had me meet him in Miami-a few days after that. Q. For what purpose? A. Fixing up the business, looking to the organization of the Louisiana Lumber Company. Q. Did you go to Miami? A.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
1924 OK 340, 224 P. 537, 98 Okla. 135, 1924 Okla. LEXIS 1165, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/potter-v-bond-okla-1924.