Cottingham v. Moore

• Decision Date: 06 February 1900
• Citation: 30 So. 784,128 Ala. 209
• Parties: COTTINGHAM v. MOORE ET AL. MOORE ET AL. v. COTTINGHAM.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

30 So. 784

128 Ala. 209

COTTINGHAM v. MOORE ET AL.

MOORE ET AL. v. COTTINGHAM.

Supreme Court of Alabama

February 6, 1900

Appeal from chancery court, Bibb county.

Bill by John H. Moore and others against M. L. Cottingham. From the judgment defendant appeals, and complainants assign cross error. Affirmed.

The complainants are the children of Robert B. Moore and Martha Ann Moore, and claim the interest in the lands as devisees under the will of Eleanor Coker, the mother of Martha Ann Moore. The respondent, M. L. Cottingham, claims the lands under a purchase of the lands made by him as administrator cum testamento annexo of the estate of Eleanor Coker deceased. The purpose of the bill and the facts of the case necessary to an understanding of the decision on the present appeal are sufficiently stated in the opinion. On the final submission of the cause upon the pleadings and proof the chancellor rendered a decree granting the relief prayed for and ordered a reference to the register, that he might state an account between the parties to the suit. In this decree ordering the reference the chancellor directed the register to credit the defendant with the sum of $400 (the amount paid by him for the land) as of the date of the death of Martha Ann Moore, and gave further directions as to the credits that should be allowed the defendant, Cottingham. Upon the coming in of the register's report, the chancellor rendered a decree granting the relief prayed for in accordance with the report of the register. From this decree the defendant Cottingham, appealed, and assigned as error the rendition of each of the decrees. In this court, by agreement between the parties, the complainants made cross assignments of error, in which they assigned as erroneous that portion of the decree of the chancellor in which he directed the register to allow the defendant the several items of credit in the statement of the account.

Logan &amp Vande Graaff, for appellant.

H. A. Jones and Ellison & Thompson, for appellees.

DOWDELL J.

Eleanor Coker died April 28, 1876, leaving a last will and testament, which was duly probated in the probate court of Bibb county. By this will she devised and bequeathed all of her estate, consisting of real and personal property, subject to the payment of her debts, to her niece, Martha Ann Moore, and Robert Benning Moore, husband of said Martha, "and the heirs of their body." The clauses in the will occurring subsequent to the one containing the above devise and bequest clearly manifest the purpose and intention of the testatrix to create in the said Martha Ann a life estate, with remainder to her children, and it is upon this construction of the will that the present bill is filed. Robert Benning Moore, the said husband, was named as executor, but failed to qualify as such. The respondent, Cottingham, took out letters of administration cum testamento annexo, and entered upon the duties of his office. This was in 1876, and shortly after the probate of the will. In January, 1877, the land, the subject-matter of this controversy, was sold under the decree of the probate court for the purpose of paying the debts of said estate. It is admitted by the bill that the proceedings had in the probate court for the sale of the land were regular on their face; but it is charged that the probate court was imposed upon by the administrator by false statements contained in his petition for the sale of said land in his averments as to the existence of debts against the estate and as to the insufficiency of personal property for the payment of debts, and that in this respect the administrator was guilty of actual fraud upon the rights of complainants. It is also charged in the bill that the administrator became the purchaser at the sale, buying through an intermediary. The life tenant, Martha Ann Moore, died in June, 1895, and the bill was filed in May, 1897. The prayer for relief is in alternative,-"if the complainants be mistaken in their charges of actual fraud by the administrator in procuring the sale of said land, then they ask to disaffirm the sale, and have an accounting, offering on their part to do equity." On a final submission of the cause on the pleadings and proof, it was determined by the decree of the chancery court that there was no fraud committed by the administrator in the proceedings before the probate court for the sale of the land, but relief was decreed complainants under the alternative prayer of the bill, and an accounting was had. From this decree the respondent, Cottingham, prosecutes his appeal to this court.

Under the view which we take of the case as presented by the record, we think it unnecessary to notice those questions discussed by counsel growing out of the accounting had under the decree. We may here make the passing observation that, as to the clause of the will which provides that in the event of the death of Martha Ann Moore the property devised and bequeathed should remain in the hands of Robert Benning Moore until the children of Martha Ann became of age, and then to be divided among them, it is unimportant under our view of and for the purposes of the case as now presented, to determine the nature or character of trust created in said Robert Benning Moore. We think the proof amply sustains the chancellor in holding that there was no fraud practiced by the administrator in procuring a sale of the land for the payment of the debts of the estate. The great weight of the evidence, by disinterested witnesses, shows that the purchase price bid and paid for the land was its highest market value. The fact is also shown that the administrator was a judgment creditor of the testatrix, with an execution lien on the land in question. The amount of this judgment, with interest, was something over $200. There were also other creditors of the estate. The price bid and paid for the land was $400. We have, then, a case, as presented by the record, of a bill filed by the remainder-men, after the termination of the life estate, against the administrator, who is a judgment creditor, with an execution lien on the land sold, buying at the administrator's sale made under the decree of the probate court for the payment of debts of the estate, without any just imputation under the facts of fraud or unfairness in the sale and purchase, praying a disaffirmance of the sale and for an accounting. No principle of equity is more firmly ingrafted on the jurisprudence of this country than that a purchase by a trustee for his own benefit at a sale of the trust property is voidable at the option of the cestui que trust, and will be set aside on timely application made ...