Friddle v. Braun

• Decision Date: 14 February 1913
• Parties: FRIDDLE v. BRAUN.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

61 So. 59

180 Ala. 556

FRIDDLE v. BRAUN.

Supreme Court of Alabama

February 14, 1913

Appeal from City Court of Birmingham; C.C. Nesmith, Judge.

Assumpsit by James A. Friddle against Louis Braun. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff appeals. Reversed and remanded.

Count 6 is as follows: "Plaintiff claims of defendant, to wit $3,000, for the breach of a contract made on, to wit, the 14th day of September, 1910, which contract is set out in the first count of this complaint, and is referred to therein and made a part of this count, the same as if fully set out in this count. And plaintiff avers that he did purchase from defendant the 92 shares of capital stock of the City Paper Company, as he promised to do in said contract and upon the terms herein named, and that plaintiff paid to and settled with the defendant for the said 92 shares of the capital stock of the City Paper Company, in the manner provided for in said contract, but the defendant failed to, and refused to, comply with all of his part of said contract in this: The defendant failed to make an inventory of all the assets of the City Paper Company at the actual cost of the goods contained and named therein to the City Paper Company; that the price or cost of a large amount of the goods set out in said inventory were greatly in excess of what said stock of goods cost the City Paper Company, to wit, in the sum of $3,000; that there were many errors made by defendant in his calculations in the said inventory, and which amounted to, to wit, $1,000 in excess of what the net amount of said assets should have been when properly calculated; that many errors were made thus: Including certain accounts, types, and other alleged assets of the City Paper Company which were not correct, and were not assets of the said City Paper Company to a large amount, to wit, several thousand dollars, in excess of what they should have been; that defendant gave credit or discount to certain persons who owed accounts to the City Paper Company which credits did not appear on said accounts on the books of the said City Paper Company, and which greatly reduced the said net assets of the said City Paper Company, and said accounts were included in said inventory as assets of the City Paper Company, without the credits given the various debtors, all of which greatly reduced the assets of said City Paper Company, to wit $3,000; that said defendant included in said inventory a certain paper cutter at the value of $2,000; that said paper cutter was not of such value as was placed on it in the inventory; that said paper cutter, previous to the day that plaintiff contracted to purchase said shares of stock, became greatly damaged and broken, and contained hidden defects of which plaintiff did not know, and could not know on account of said defects being concealed or not easily observed; that the defendant at the time said contract was made, and at the time said paper cutter was included in said inventory, knew of the defects in said cutter, but withheld them and concealed the fact that said paper cutter had been greatly injured; that said paper cutter did not exceed in value the sum of, to wit, $200, for that it could not and would not perform the work for which it was made and intended, to wit the cutting of large quantities of paper. And plaintiffs aver that there were many and various other defects, mistakes errors, and misrepresentations made by defendant not hereinbefore mentioned or specified, but all of which tended to, and did, decrease the net assets of the City Paper Company, which proximately resulted in decreasing the real value of each of the 92 shares of stock, which the plaintiff purchased from the defendant, and which decrease in the value of said shares of stock resulted in the plaintiff being damaged in the sum of $3,000."

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