First Nat. Bank of Sibley, Iowa v. Doeden
| Decision Date | 29 August 1907 |
| Citation | 113 N.W. 81,21 S.D. 400 |
| Parties | FIRST NAT. BANK OF SIBLEY, IOWA, v. DOEDEN. |
| Court | South Dakota Supreme Court |
Appeal from Circuit Court, Spink County.
Action by the First National Bank of Sibley, Iowa, against George H Doeden. From a judgment for defendant, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed
Sterling & Clark, for appellant.
E. W Fiske and Wilson & Son, for respondent.
Appellant an Iowa banking corporation, brought this action as an indorsee in due course to recover the amount of four promissory notes, each for $300, executed by respondent at his place of residence in the state of Minnesota, where they were all made payable to Charles Peters, or order, with interest from date at the rate of 6 per cent. per annum. Upon the theory that the statute of Minnesota and not the law of the forum should govern in determining the validity of these notes in the hands of an innocent purchaser for value before maturity, the court permitted respondent to introduce testimony sufficient to show that his signature was obtained thereto by the fraudulent representation that the several papers were merely requests in writing that he be credited with dividends which it was falsely claimed would be declared every three months on certain shares of corporate stock for which he had been induced to subscribe in what appears to be a worthless oil company of which Peters was acting as trustee. In promoting the scheme to get the notes Peters was assisted by one Havinga, respondent's nephew, who was well educated in English and could converse in German, which was the only language that respondent could read or write further than to sign his name. He was over 65 years of age and scarcely able to speak understandable English, so that in transacting business it was his practice to call to his assistance some person in whom he had confidence; and the testimony shows that he had known Havinga for many years, had received similar assistance from him on different occasions, and at the time of the transaction had implicit confidence in his integrity and trusted him more than any one else. In the forenoon of the 25th day of June, 1903, Havinga, while sharing the hospitality of respondent's home, very craftily introduced the subject of oil by representing that Peters, the purported trustee of the company, who was then in town, had aided him materially in securing a large amount of the stock, which had proved very valuable, and in the afternoon of that day they together called upon the old man, and by the use of the grossest fraud and artifice induced him to sign four pink papers which they represented to be necessary in order to authorize the company to apply the dividends, to be declared during the first year, in full payment for certain shares of stock which he was to receive later without any further consideration. These papers, one of which was written by Havinga, were not signed until he had pretended to read them to respondent, and had assured him that he was not to be cheated, and that they were not notes, nor anything requiring the payment of money, but merely the requests above mentioned. A few days later, and after the certificates of stock had been sent from St. Paul and received by respondent, Peters and Havinga called at his house and stated that the papers he had signed previously were not on the company's blanks, and for that reason alone he must sign four white papers of the same import, and, after Havinga had pretended to read them with the explanation that they were the same and...
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