Shappert v. Roettger

343 N.E.2d 695, 36 Ill. App. 3d 452, 1976 Ill. App. LEXIS 2041
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedFebruary 6, 1976
Docket74-54
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 343 N.E.2d 695 (Shappert v. Roettger) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Shappert v. Roettger, 343 N.E.2d 695, 36 Ill. App. 3d 452, 1976 Ill. App. LEXIS 2041 (Ill. Ct. App. 1976).

Opinion

Mr. JUSTICE SEIDENFELD

delivered the opinion of the court:

The defendant, Richard Roettger, appeals from an interlocutory judgment order which denied his motion to dissolve a preliminary injunction prohibiting the sale of shared crops. He contends that the plaintiff did not establish a right to the issuance of tire injunction order and that the order therefore may not be a proper basis for a finding of contempt.

The plaintiff, Frederick W. Shappert, was the owner of a large farm property which he leased to the defendant under a share-crop lease. On August 9, 1973, Shappert filed a verified complaint in two counts. In Count I plaintiff alleged that under the lease he was entitled to an undivided one-half of all produce and one-half of the increase of all livestock on the farm; and that the defendant had converted a specified number of heifers and cows and an undetermined quantity of grain. In this count plaintiff prayed for a money judgment. In Count II plaintiff repeated the allegations of Count I and further stated that defendant had taken possession and sold cattle, a one-half interest which belonged to the plaintiff; that the defendant had threatened to convert to his own use and sell additional cattle; that this would destroy the value of the cattle, could not be adequately redressed exclusively by an action at law, and would cause further irreparable injury to plaintiff. In this count plaintiff prayed for a temporary injunction restraining the defendant from taking possession of, converting to his own use and selling cattle in which the plaintiff owned an undivided one-half interest.

Defendant filed a motion to dismiss the complaint. On August 17, 1973, the court in a docket order denied defendant’s motion to dismiss, ruled on defendant to answer within 30 days, granted a “temporary” injunction against the sale of grain and cattle and continued the cause generally for a trial on tire merits. The defendant’s answer was filed on September 10, 1973. The preliminary injunction went into effect on September 13, 1973, upon filing of plaintiff’s bond and tire writ issued. The preliminary injunction order recited that defendant had sold cattle and grain in July of 1973 contrary to tire lease agreement, that irreparable harm would result if defendant were permitted to sell livestock and grain in the future, and that defendant had stated in open court that he will make no sales of livestock or grain without the further-order of the court. The order restrained defendant from:

“* * * taking possession of, converting to his own use and selling cattle and grain in which the plaintiff owns an undivided one-half interest, until further order of this Court, and that neither party shall sell any such property except by their agreement or upon the order of this Court.”

On November 20, 1973, plaintiff filed a sworn petition seeking a contempt citation. He alleged that defendant had contracted to sell 4,000 bushels of corn and 1,000 bushels of soy beans for future delivery in violation of the injunction order and that defendant had made delivery of all of the soy beans and 2201.77 bushels of corn without the consent of the plaintiff. On December 20, 1973, Count I of the complaint was dismissed by stipulation. On December 21, 1973, the court, over defendant’s objection, permitted plaintiff to amend Count II to add “and grain” in the places where “cattle” alone had been specified. Subsequently a supplemental complaint was filed with leave of court alleging further sales and contracts unknown to plaintiff at the time of the filing of the original petition. The evidentiary hearing was held on December 21 and 22, 1973, and the record shows that inquiry was permitted into both the merits of the injunction and whether it had been violated.

The defendant, called by the plaintiff as an adverse witness, testified that on June 7, 1973, he had contracted with Sandahl Farm Service, Inc., to deliver 500 bushels of beans on November 17, 1973; and had contracted with Central Grain Co. on June 25, July 20 and August 22, 1973, to deliver a total of 4,000 bushels of com on December 15, 1973. He acknowledged that deliveries were made under the contracts at various times in October and November of 1973. Defendant testified that he had told Patrick Mattison, plaintiff’s son-in-law, and plaintiff’s agent, Maxwell Newport, about the contracts in October of 1973 some time after he had entered into them; that Newport told him to fill the bins with com and that they would go to town with the balance; that there was an estimated com yield in 1973 of 18,500 bushels and only a 10,100 bushel capacity in the farm bins for storage. He also said that he had in previous years contracted for various future deliveries of commonly owned corn. He testified that in 1973 he told Keith Grennan, plaintiff’s farm manager, that he had contracted to sell 500 bushels of soy beans out of an estimated 2,700 bushels and that he delivered the beans because he had no place to store them and not intending to disobey the court order. He said that he had sold beans in the same manner in 1972.

Patrick Mattison testified for plaintiff that he first learned of defendant’s contracts to sell grain in a conversation with plaintiff on October 19, 1973. He further testified that he had on numerous occasions told Roettger not to sell “anything” unless “we” know about it. He recalled that he particularly told defendant this on both October 21 and October 31 in 1973.

Keith Grennan, plaintiff’s farm manager, testified that he had no knowledge of any grain contracts in 1973 until he learned about the Central Grain contracts in August 1973 and the Sandahl contracts in October 1973. He testified that he and plaintiff followed the defendant’s truck when the deliveries of beans were made to the Sandahl Company on October 16 and 17, 1973. He further testified that plaintiff instructed him to allow the deliveries to be made. He also testified that he had no knowledge of Roettger s contract for future deliveries of grain and had never been told about them by defendant.

Plaintiff, however, testified that he had told defendant personally and by letter dated February 14, 1973, that no sales or purchases of property in which plaintiff and defendant had a one-half interest were to be made without discussion either with plaintiff or his then manager, Keith Grennan, prior to the transaction. He stated that he had never had any conversation with Roettger in 1973, in which Roettger told him that he had contracted to sell com or soy beans. Hie plaintiff was shown various contracts with either the Sandahl Company or the Central Grain Company and testified that prior to October of 1973 when he saw the deliveries being made he did not know of the existence of the contracts. He also denied that he had any knowledge of sales of futures in any prior year. He said that when he saw the October 16 and 17 deliveries in the tracks he assumed that they were being sold on the open market and not on future contracts.

At the conclusion of the plaintiff’s case defendant moved for a finding of the issues for defendant contending that the allegations of Count II related to jointly owned cattle and that there was no proof of conversion of cattle. Hie court ruled that the parties had proceeded throughout with reference to enjoining both sales of cattle and grain and permitted the amendment of Count II to include the words “and grain.”

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Bluebook (online)
343 N.E.2d 695, 36 Ill. App. 3d 452, 1976 Ill. App. LEXIS 2041, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/shappert-v-roettger-illappct-1976.