Troyak v. Enos

204 F.2d 536
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedJune 4, 1953
Docket10760, 10761
StatusPublished
Cited by11 cases

This text of 204 F.2d 536 (Troyak v. Enos) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Troyak v. Enos, 204 F.2d 536 (7th Cir. 1953).

Opinion

LINDLEY, Circuit judge.

Plaintiff brought this suit against her mother Ethel, her half-sister Jeanette, her half-brother George E. and the Enos Coal Mining Company, a corporation, to recover from George certain shares of the capital stock of the corporation held by him, on the claim that, as her trustee, agent and fiduciary representative, he had so violated his obligations that certain portions of the stock which he had procured in his individual right should be declared held in trust by him for plaintiff and ordered transferred to her. She sought also to recover the value of some 120 shares of the corporate stock, her conveyance of which to other persons she claimed he had wrongfully *538 procured in like violation of his fiduciary undertakings.

The cause was referred to a special master, who took the evidence and filed a report including voluminous findings of fact and short conclusions of law. In the latter, he held that plaintiff could not recover for any of the 120 shares last mentioned hut was entitled to have delivered to her 250 shares, plus dividends, upon payment by her to George of $25,000. The court approved and confirmed the report and entered judgment accordingly. Cross appeals were perfected. Plaintiff asserts that the trial court erred in denying recovery for the 120 shares and, as to the 250 shares awarded her, that the allowance is insufficient and should be increased. On the other hand defendants insist that there should have been no recovery whatsoever and that the suit should have been dismissed for want of equity.

The 250 shares ordered surrendered by George to plaintiff upon her payment of $25,000 are part and parcel of 1000 shares for which George obtained an option and which he ultimately received from the company. The issue between the parties centers chiefly about these shares, i. e., whether they are trust property or belong to George personally; consequently, in order to dispose of it properly, we have found it necessary to examine somewhat carefully the evidence produced by the respective parties.

Among the master’s findings are the following: The Enos Coal Mining Company is an Ohio corporation, mining, selling and distributing coal in Indiana. George A. Enos, husband of defendant Ethel, and father of defendants Jeanette Galbreth and George E. Enos, and step-father of plaintiff, Durive Troyak, Ethel’s daughter by a previous marriage, organized and operated the corporation. He undertook to foster and protect the. business as a family investment. Ethel, Jeanette and the plaintiff had no substantial business experience. The son George, upon graduating from college and business school, immediately began to work for the company. The father discussed with the son his personal problems and those arising from financing and operating the company. Jeanette had married at the age of 19, was a housewife and relied upon her brother George in all business matters. Plaintiff had the equivalent of a high school education and operated a small shop with her first husband, McCurdy, for a short time, but had had no executive or administrative experience. She married her second husband, Troyak, in January 1944, and for the next few years, while he was in the army, lived near him.

The corporation had 10,000 shares of capital stock, of which the father originally owned or controlled 5106. ■ Prior to his death in 1940, he transferred 4,716 shares to his wife, retaining only 390 shares. Between 1930 and 1940 he became financially involved, borrowing substantial sums of money and assigning his shares- as security therefor. Ethel likewise assigned to the same creditor the shares registered in her name. The net result was that in June, 1940, the Enos family owned stock as follows: the father 390 shares, Ethel 1716, Jeanette, Durive and George, each 1000, all subject, however, to liens in favor of certain creditors. Because of the exigencies confronting him, the father created a voting trust, July 1, 1940, under which all 5106 shares were deposited with the trustees. All the stock was pledged, first to a bank, for a loan it had made and then, to a syndicate of minority stockholders for indebtedness owing it. The senior Enos, having died October 17, 1940, Fred S. McConnell succeeded him as one of the trustees.

At the time the voting trust agreement was executed, the father was in failing health and decided further to create a family trust, the corpus of which consisted of the 4716 shares owned by Ethel, Durive, Jeanette and the son George. The mother and the three children assigned all their voting trust certificates to the son as trustee in the following amounts-: Ethel 1716 shares, and each of the three children, 1000 shares. These shares then became trust property, subject to the assignments to creditors. The agreement provided that when the debts were paid and the security released by the creditors, the shares would *539 become the property of the trust estate, and that the trustee would collect the dividends thereon and pay them “to those * * who are living at the time of the Trustee’s receipt of such income”. The agreement was to terminate upon the death of all but •one of the beneficiaries, and thereupon the trustee was to cause all trust property to be assigned to the surviving beneficiary.

When the father died, his estate was hopelessly insolvent, his assets aggregating about $24,000 and his debts $208,000. As the syndicate still had a first lien upon the 390 shares of the company’s stock held by deceased’s administrator and upon the 4716 shares held by the trustee, for a substantial debt, it became apparent that some of the stock would have to be sold in order to liquidate the indebtedness. The son, ■George, on January 21, 1941, obtained from Ethel, Durive and Jeanette a power of attorney, authorizing him to act for them in all matters relating to the settlement of the father’s estate and the claims against the same, including full power to perform all and every act requisite and necessary in the premises, including the right to assign or otherwise hypothecate their voting trust certificates.

On June 7, 1941, George, as trustee, negotiated an arrangement with the syndicate, whereby the latter purchased 2430 of the shares held in trust at $60 per share, giving the trustee an option to repurchase them at $100 per share, as a unit, between July 1, 1946 and October 1, 1946. The voting trust of July 1, 1940 was succeeded by a new one for 5500 shares, including the 2430 shares, to continue in existence until October 1, 1946. The 5,500 shares so placed under the control of the new voting trust consisted of the 2430 sold to the syndicate by the family trust, 2071 so-called “free” shares still held by the family trust and 999 shares contributed by various members of the syndicate.

When the 2430 shares were sold, George received the purchase price, $145,800, and used it in settlement of the debts of his father’s estate. The family trust then took over the 390 shares owned by the father’s administrator at $60 per share and released the estate from any liability. As a result, the corpus of the family trust was depleted by the sale of 2430 shares sold to the syndicate at the price of $60 per share but still retained the option to repurchase them.

The family trust was modified by an instrument dated July 1, 1941, signed by George, Jeanette, and Ethel and by George, as attorney in fact for the plaintiff, and by himself as trustee.

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204 F.2d 536, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/troyak-v-enos-ca7-1953.