Citizens State Bank of New Sharon v. Haworth

• Decision Date: 14 December 1928
• Docket Number: 39277
• Citation: 222 N.W. 428,208 Iowa 1100
• Parties: CITIZENS STATE BANK OF NEW SHARON, Appellant, v. C. L. HAWORTH et al., Appellees
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

222 N.W. 428

208 Iowa 1100

CITIZENS STATE BANK OF NEW SHARON, Appellant, v. C. L. HAWORTH et al., Appellees

No. 39277

Supreme Court of Iowa, Des Moines

December 14, 1928

REHEARING DENIED SEPTEMBER 30, 1929.

Appeal from Mahaska District Court.--D. W. HAMILTON, Judge.

Action in equity, based on a chattel mortgage given by C. L. Haworth and Mae W. Haworth to the plaintiff, aided by a specific attachment, and also a general attachment on certain property. Kenneth Haworth, one of the defendants, intervened and claimed the property. The property covered by the special attachment was held to be the property of said Kenneth Haworth, and the property taken under the general attachment to be the property of C. L. Haworth. The plaintiff and Kenneth Haworth appeal; but for convenience, we will refer to Kenneth Haworth in the opinion as appellee.

Affirmed.

A. W Palmer and Devitt & Eichhorn, for appellant.

T. J. Bray, for appellees.

ALBERT J. STEVENS, C. J., and EVANS, FAVILLE, DE GRAFF, and MORLING, JJ., concur.

OPINION

ALBERT, J.

I. The fact situation necessary to an understanding of this lawsuit is as follows:

C. L. and Mae W. Haworth are husband and wife, and Kenneth Haworth is their son. Agnes Haworth is the mother of C. L. Haworth. She held a mortgage on certain described personal property of C. L. Haworth, reciting a consideration of $ 2,500. There is no dispute that this mortgage was first on the property described therein, and was duly recorded. The Citizens State Bank of New Sharon held a second mortgage on the same property, with some additional property, for the sum of approximately $ 5,900, which chattel mortgage was also recorded. Financial difficulties overtook C. L. Haworth, and Agnes Haworth foreclosed her chattel mortgage, and Kenneth Haworth purchased the property sold thereunder, for the sum of $ 2,825.75. The deputy sheriff, J. F. Hook, who conducted this sale under the chattel mortgage for Mrs. Haworth, turned over to her attorney a check for the balance received on said sale, after deducting the expenses, in the sum of $ 2,640. The plaintiff gave notice at Mrs. Haworth's sale that it had a chattel mortgage on this property, and thereafter brought this action, making all of the parties, including Kenneth Haworth, defendants.

In plaintiff's petition it sets up the note and chattel mortgage executed by C. L. and Mae W. Haworth, and asks judgment for the amount due thereon; sets up grounds and asks for a special attachment, which was in due time issued, and the property covered by its said chattel mortgage levied upon. Agnes and Kenneth Haworth are made defendants, and as to them it is alleged that "they did claim to have some lien upon, or interest in and to, the chattels covered by said chattel mortgage;" but plaintiff alleges that whatever lien or interest the said defendants, or any of them, may have, is "junior and inferior" to the lien of the plaintiff's said mortgage.

In due time, the defendant Kenneth Haworth filed a motion to discharge the writ of attachment above referred to, and as grounds therefor alleges that he is the absolute owner of said property, and acquired ownership by virtue of purchase at the chattel mortgage foreclosure sale above referred to; and he asks that an order be made by the court discharging said attachment as to the personal property hereinbefore described, and directing the sheriff of Mahaska County to release the same to this defendant. This matter came on for hearing before the court, and after a full hearing, at which witnesses were examined on both sides, the court overruled this motion to discharge this property from the writ. As to the property levied upon under the general writ of attachment, which consisted of certain corn in the field, shock fodder, and hay, together with 350 bushels of oats, a similar motion was made to release this property from the attachment, on which motion there seems to have been no ruling.

Whereupon, Kenneth Haworth filed a petition of intervention, under Section 12136, Code of 1924, setting up a description of the property levied upon by both writs of attachment, and asking that the court hold that he is the absolute owner of all of the personal property so levied upon, and that the same be discharged from said attachment and the property restored to him, as intervener. The plaintiff moved to strike this so-called "petition of intervention," on the ground that there was no authority in law for the filing of the same, because Kenneth Haworth was a defendant in the original action, and therefore did not come within the provisions of Section 12136. The court overruled this motion. Plaintiff then answered the petition of intervention, by admitting that it caused the writs of attachment to be levied, as alleged by the intervener, but denied that the intervener, Kenneth Haworth, was the owner of said property. As another defense to the petition of intervention, it pleaded the facts of Kenneth Haworth's having filed a motion to discharge the property under the writs of attachment, the trial of the same by the court, and the overruling of the motion to so discharge said property, and pleaded this as an adjudication of his rights in which he claimed to be the owner of the property. It further pleaded that the sale under the Agnes Haworth mortgage was fraudulent, and that Kenneth Haworth participated in such fraudulent arrangement between C. L. and Agnes Haworth.

C. L Agnes, and Kenneth Haworth filed separate answers to plaintiff's original petition. The evidence in the case was submitted, and the court found that Kenneth Haworth was the owner of all of the property purchased by him at the mortgage foreclosure sale. The court further found, however, that the 60 acres of corn levied upon under the general attachment did not belong to the said Kenneth Haworth, and as to such corn, his petition of intervention was dismissed. The evidence, in addition to the facts above recited, tends to show that Kenneth Haworth was about 23 years of age at the time of the trial, was unmarried, and had lived all of his life at home with his parents; that he was a sufferer from epilepsy, and was not in good health. He worked for his father, a tenant farmer, and did some work outside, and had accumulated a small amount of money, which, at his extreme estimates, amounted to $ 400. At the time of the foreclosure sale, he talked over with his father the matter of buying the property covered by his grandmother's chattel mortgage, and went to plaintiff bank to see if he could make some arrangements to buy the same. There seems to have been an understanding between him and...