Haines v. M. S. Welker & Co.
| Decision Date | 11 January 1918 |
| Docket Number | No. 31671.,31671. |
| Citation | 182 Iowa 431,165 N.W. 1027 |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
| Parties | HAINES v. M. S. WELKER & CO. ET AL. |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from District Court, Pottawattamie County; Thomas Arthur, Judge.
Suit to recover damages on the ground that defendants sent an obligation of the plaintiff to it out of the state of Iowa, with intent to deprive the plaintiff of the benefit of the Iowa exemption laws, and that such wrongful intent was accomplished by depriving the plaintiff of wages which could not have been reached had suit been brought in Iowa. Plaintiff had a verdict for both actual and exemplary damages, and defendants appeal. Reversed and remanded.George S. Wright and Addison G. Kistle, both of Council Bluffs, for appellants.
Thomas Q. Harrison, of Council Bluffs, for appellee.
[1] I. The plaintiff made notes to the defendants. They transferred the same, and suit thereon was brought in a Nebraska court, wherein judgment on the notes was entered. Without apparently making any issue of it, the plaintiff injected into an answer filed in the Nebraska court a statement that the transfer of the notes was in violation of a penal statute of Iowa, and was made with intent to wrongfully deprive the maker of the notes of the exemption laws of the state of Iowa. The appellant says that this allegation in answer bars the present suit of the plaintiff because that rests upon a charge of the same wrong. But the Nebraska judgment creates no estoppel unless it had occasion to determine whether the transfer was made with such intent. The naked fact that the original payee of notes had conspired to deprive the maker of exemption rights has no bearing upon whether his assignee may recover judgment upon the notes. Whether the notes had or had not been transferred with such intent judgment was due on notes, the making and nonpayment of which were confessed. The plea of estoppel by adjudication is untenable, because no judgment can create an estoppel to relitigate matter which has no bearing upon whether such judgment should be entered. To be sure, the Nebraska judgment gave the process by which the exempt wages were seized. But no attempt was made to resist that sequestration. If having so resisted could create the estoppel now urged upon us, nonresistance is a sufficient answer.
II. If the defendant transferred the notes made them by plaintiff to a nonresident of Iowa, with intent that action should be brought in the courts of another state and judgment thereon should deprive the plaintiff of wages which could not be seized had suit been brought in Iowa, then the defendants violated a statute of this state which makes the so doing of these things punishable as a misdemeanor. The verdict, of necessity, declares that the statute had been violated by the defendants. We could not have interfered had the jury found the contrary. On the other hand, we cannot agree with the appellant that there was no evidence to support the finding made.
[2][3] II. (a) Starting, then, with the proposition that the defendants violated this statute that of itself gave the plaintiff a cause of action (Code of 1897, § 3444; Call v. Larabee, 60 Iowa, 212, 14 N. W. 237;Jones v. Register Co., 177 Iowa, 144, 158 N. W. 572) and the next step in the inquiry is whether the wrong found caused actual loss. The carrying out of the transfer resulted in taking from the plaintiff $47 due him for wages which could not have been taken if suit and seizure had not been instituted and made outside of Iowa. In other words, if judgment had been obtained in Iowa this $47 could not have been taken to pay the debt of plaintiff. It is urged by appellant, and in a broad sense is true, that no loss is sustained by having one's property applied in satisfaction of his debts. See Uppinghouse v. Mundel, 103 Ind. 238, 2 N. E. 719; Weeks, Dam. Inj. 12; Cooley, Torts, 180 et seq. The plaintiff is presumed to be solvent, and if nothing appeared upon that point we should have to hold that seizing these wages as was done, if wrongful, yet caused no loss, because the most it did was to cancel a debt of the plaintiff with exempt money which could otherwise have been canceled by seizing other of his property. But it does appear affirmatively that the plaintiff had no property other than his wages which could be applied to the satisfaction of his debts. Therefore engaging in plan which took these wages from him deprived him of his exemption rights and caused him a loss, though the sequestration paid a debt. If that be not so, the right to sue because a criminal act has been done, and the right to have wages exempt, are academic rights; that is to say, though it is a misdemeanor to make a wrongful seizure of exempt property, and though the commission of such misdemeanor gives a right of action, on the theory of appellant, an application of the thing seized to the payment of a debt, the very thing the statute on exemptions prohibits, accomplished by means which are criminal, would be a full defense to the commission of both wrongful acts--doing the wrong would cure the wrong. We think the wrongful act of the defendants found by the jury resulted in actual damages in $47, the amount of the wages seized.
II. (b) The appellee claims he suffered further actual damages because both he and the defendants knew when he gave his notes that if his employer was garnished the plaintiff would be discharged from his employment; that being garnished caused the employer to discharge the plaintiff; that though diligent in seeking other employment, he was unable to obtain it to any considerable extent; and that so a further actual loss occurred. It suffices to say as to this that the record affirmatively shows plaintiff was not discharged because of the service of the garnishee process, but because he had made an assignment of his wages as security for the loan evidenced by his notes.
[4] II. (c) In an amendment to petition the appellee asserts that his discharge was caused because he made such assignment. And we think that this allegation is proved. But it does not follow that this makes the defendants responsible for loss occasioned by such discharge. In effect, the position of appellee on this head is that he executed this assignment because it was demanded as security; that both plaintiff and defendant knew that if such an assignment became known to the employer plaintiff would be discharged; that the assignment being of exempt wages was void because the wife of plaintiff did not join therein; that when the defendants transferred their notes they transferred therewith the said assignment; that as part of the plan involved in the transfer such assignment was brought to the notice of the employer; and that therefore the plaintiff was discharged. It might be said that the rule of the employer concerning discharge because of an assignment of wages refers only to a valid assignment, and that when plaintiff claims the assignment was void he meets his own case and demonstrates that such assignment as was made did not cause his discharge. But we do not care to place ourselves upon that ground in view of the fact that, valid or void, the employer thought it sufficient cause for discharge. We confine the decision to the question whether the execution of a valid assignment, and the bringing of same to the notice of the employer by the defendants, gave the plaintiff a right of action for loss due to the ensuing discharge. The plaintiff was at liberty to borrow or not to borrow. This carried with it the right to refuse making the assignment. He chose to make it. He knew that he gave it to secure his debt; he gave it so that the debt might be satisfied out of the wages assigned. He knew this could not be effected without advising the employer of the existence of the assignment. Had the assignment been presented, though no transfer of the notes had been made, and though no suit had been instituted in Nebraska, its effect upon his employment would have been just what it was in the actual case. So that, in the last analysis, the claim of the...
To continue reading
Request your trial