Allen v. Lyness

• Decision Date: 16 February 1909
• Citation: 81 Conn. 628,71 A. 936
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: ALLEN v. LYNESS.

71 A. 936

81 Conn. 628

ALLEN

v. LYNESS.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

Feb. 16, 1909.

Appeal from Court of Common Pleas, Hartford County; Epaphroditus Peck, Judge.

Action by Catherine Allen against Bridget F. Lyness for refusal to pay a judgment debt, while having sufficient nonexempt property concealed and withheld, so that it could not be taken by legal process. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Percy S. Bryant and Harry M. Burke, for appellant.

Herbert O. Bowers, for appellee.

BALDWIN, C. J. This complaint (treating it, as both parties have done, as charging fraud) states facts which, if true, gave an action under Gen. St. 1002, § 1009. It was unnecessary to aver that the action was brought on the statute. Williams v. Mead, 80 Conn. 434, 436, 68 Atl. 1009. The complaint did not describe the estate concealed or withheld, but it was, as the plaintiff claimed on the trial, an interest in land. It was conceded that the defendant owned an equity of redemption in this land, under a deed from her father, from 1893 to 1899; that she then conveyed it to her only child, Margaret A. Lyness; that the latter, in July, 1902, reconveyed it; that no money was paid as a consideration for either conveyance; that on September 22, 1902, the defendant reconveyed it to her daughter, subject to a new mortgage, which she had put upon it, for $400; that in 1904 the defendant became indebted to the plaintiff; that the plaintiff in 1905 recovered a judgment on such debt against the defendant, who refused to pay on demand; and that the equity in the land was then worth enough to pay it in full. The plaintiff offered evidence to prove that the $400 mortgage was put on by the defendant in August, 1902, partly to pay debts which she owed to the amount of over $225, and that the defendant in many ways dealt with the land as if she were the absolute owner, while the paper title was in her daughter. It did not appear that any debts due from the defendant on September 22, 1902, remained unpaid, excepting her $400 mortgage note. The defendant offered evidence to prove that her earnings and her daughter's earnings had enabled her father to acquire the land; that he conveyed to her on the understanding that she should convey to Margaret when the latter was older; that another relative had contributed $300 towards the purchase of the land, and expressed the desire that it should go to Margaret's benefit; and that the defendant had dealt with the land in behalf of Margaret, and to save her the trouble of attending to it.

The plaintiff asked the court to instruct the jury that a person might, as to his creditors, be the real owner of laud the legal title to which stood in another's name; that the law would not permit the owner of laud to convey it to another, if this would prevent his creditors from collecting their dues: that if such a conveyance were not made to a bona fide purchaser for value, the equitable title would remain in the grantor, and his creditors could seize the land to satisfy their claims; and that, if they found that the defendant was the equitable owner of the land in question, or that the conveyance to Margaret A. Lyness prevented the plaintiff from collecting her judgment against the defendant, the plaintiff was entitled to a verdict. These requests were presented as a unit. It would have been error to instruct the jury that if a conveyance of land were not made to a bona fide purchaser for value, the equitable title would remain in the grantor, and his creditors could seize the land to satisfy their claims. Such a charge would have ignored the distinction between creditors who were such when the conveyance was made, and those who became creditors subsequently. Error cannot be assigned on the refusal to comply with a request for instructions, some of which are inconsistent with law.

The plaintiff also asked the court to instruct the jury that if the defendant, while Indebted, conveyed to her daughter upon a valuable, but inadequate, consideration, such inadequacy was evidence of actual fraud; that whether a transaction was fraudulent as to creditors was always a question of fact; that the essence of fraud consists chiefly in motive, and is seldom reached through direct testimony; and therefore that the law, in many cases,...