Southern Lumber & Supply Co. v. Verdier

51 Fla. 570
CourtSupreme Court of Florida
DecidedJanuary 15, 1906
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 51 Fla. 570 (Southern Lumber & Supply Co. v. Verdier) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Southern Lumber & Supply Co. v. Verdier, 51 Fla. 570 (Fla. 1906).

Opinion

Parkhill, J.

This is a creditor’s bill in the usual form, filed in the Circuit Court of Hillsborough county, in chancery, on 4th day of February, 1905, by appellant, as creditor of Terrell C. Verdier, to reach and subject to the payment of its debts certain real estate, the legal title to which was in the name of his wife, Lena E. Verdier.

I. It is insisted that the court erred in finding the answer of defendants responsive to the bill of complaint. The bill alleges that “prior to the rendition of the judgment, but after the indebtedness upon which the same [572]*572was rendered had accrued, to-wit: on the 23rd day of May, A. D. 1903, defendant Terrell C. Verdier, being then insolvent made a pretended conveyance in fee of said described real estate to one Andrew Jackson Youngblood for the pretended consideration of thirteen hundred ($1300.00) dollars, and on the 25th day of May, A. D. 1903, the said Andrew Jackson Youngblood conveyed the same in fee to Lena E. Verdier, the wife of said Teimell C. Verdier, and one of the defendants heretofore named for the pretended consideration of thirteen hundred and twenty-five ($1325.00) dollars.

“Your orator further represents that the said conveyance was not real, but was a mere sham, made with intent to defraud your orator out of its just demands; that no consideration was paid by the said Andrew Jackson. Youngblood to the said Terrell C. Verdier, or by the said Lena E. Verdier to the said Andrew Jackson Youngblood for the said conveyance,” &c., &c.

The bill prayed: To the end that the said Terrell C. Verdier and Lena E. Verdier, his wife, who are made parties defendant to this bill, may be required upon their several and respective corporal oaths and according to the best and utmost of their several and respective knowledge, remembrance, information and belief, full, true, direct and perfect answer make to all and singular the matters and things hereinbefox’e stated and charged as fully and particularly as if the same were here again repeated and they severally thereto interrogated, and especially that they may each set forth and state the facts and circumstances attending the said conveyance, the amount of money actually paid thereon by the said Andrew Jackson Youngblood, to the said Terrell C. Verdier and the said Lena E. Verdier to the said Andrew Jackson Youngblood and how and in what manner the payments [573]*573were or were to be made, from 'whence the said Lena E. Verdier derived the funds with which to make said purchase, and the purpose of said conveyance.” »

After stating the conveyance of the described real estate by the defendants to Youngblood and by Youngblood to Lena E. Verdier, the answer alleges “that the said conveyance was made for the purpose of putting the title to the land described in the complainant’s bill of complaint in the name of the defendant Lena E. Verdier, and that the said Youngblood was only used for the purpose of transferring the title to said property from the defendant Terrell C. Verdier, to the defendant Lena E. Verdier, and for no other purpose.”

The defendants, in their answer, then deny that the said conveyance was a mere sham, &c., and answer further “that the transfer of the title to the real estate described in the complainant’s bill of complaint from the defendants Terrell C. Verdier to the said Lena E. Verdier was for a valuable consideration and a then existing claim of the said Lena E. Verdier against the said Terrell C. Verdier,” and then the answer sets forth more fully the nature of the consideration for the transfer of the title to the real estate and of the existing claim of Lena E. Verdier against Terrell C. Verdier, as follows:

“These defendants further answering say that in the Spring of 1903, that they were the owners of a certain tract of land in Washington’s subdivision in the city of Tampa on which they resided as their home place and that on or about the 3rd day of April A. D. 1903, the said defendant, Terrell C. Verdier, sold the same to W. L. Hanks for the sum of twenty-two hundred dollars, and that this defendant, Lena E. Verdier, did not -want to sign the deed and execute the papers to convey the said property to the [574]*574said W. L. Hanks, but that the said Terrell C. Verdier promised and agreed with her that he would turn over to her the money derived from the sale of the said property so that she would have it for her own use, if she would sign the deed to the said property, as they were getting a good price for said property; that afterwards the defendant Terrell C. Verdier, having use for said money told the defendant Lena E. Verdier, that if she would let him have the money that he would convey to her. the property described in the complainant’s bill of complaint, together with lots one and two of block nine of Allice Kelley’s subdivision, on which property there were at that time mortgages for twelve hundred dollars; that the said Terrell C. Verdier used the said money and that in carrying out said agreement, the said Terrell C. Verdier conveyed to the defendant the said lands described in the complainant’s bill of complaint, and also lots one and l wo of Block nine as aforesaid.”

We think that the answer as far as it goes is responsive to the bill. One says there was no consideration, the other responds there was a consideration and explains what that consideration was. Nalle & Co. v. Lively, 15 Fla. 130.

When the answer is confined to such facts as are necessarily required by the bill and those inseparably connected with them, forming a part of one and the same transaction, it is responsive to the bill as well when it discharges as when it charges the defendant. Maxwell v. Jacksonville Loan and Improvement Co., 45 Fla. 425, 34 South. Rep. 255. The effect of this answer as evidence in favor of defendants will be considered hereafter in this opinion.

II. The other ground of contention is that the court erred in finding the equities with the defendants because [575]*575“the answer .shows that the transaction was not bona fide, but was a voluntary conveyance in fraud of the rights of the appellant, or without adequate consideration.

This cause was set down for hearing upon bill, answer and replication by agreement of the parties before the expiration of the three months allowed by the statute for the táking of testimony, and the allegations of the answer responsive to the bill will be taken as true, but it must be further observed that facts set forth in an answer and considered as true are to be considered according to their legal import. Maxwell v. Jacksonville Loan and Improvement Co., supra. The rule as to making an answer evidence in favor of the defendants when a case is heard on bill, answer and replication, requires that it should not only be responsive, but direct, positive and unequivocal. Kellogg v. Singer Manf’g Co., 35 Fla. 99, 17 South. Rep. 68. We think the answer of the defendants in its allegation of the bona fides of the transaction and the consideration for the conveyance fall far short of being direct, positive and unequivocal. It is not at all clear from the allegations of the answer that the $2200 received from the sale of the “home place,” and which she paid her husband for the other real estate, was not a gift to Mrs. Verdier from her husband. It is not shown how the defendants owned the “home place.” -It is not alleged to have been the homestead of the husband, exempt under the law from the payment of his debts.

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Bluebook (online)
51 Fla. 570, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/southern-lumber-supply-co-v-verdier-fla-1906.