Haycraft v. Adams

• Decision Date: 03 August 1933
• Docket Number: 5217
• Citation: 24 P.2d 1110,82 Utah 347
• Court: Utah Supreme Court
• Parties: HAYCRAFT v. ADAMS

24 P.2d 1110

82 Utah 347

HAYCRAFT v. ADAMS

No. 5217

Supreme Court of Utah

August 3, 1933

Appeal from District Court, Third District, Salt Lake County; O. W McConkie, Judge.

Action by J. I. Haycraft against W. H. Adams, Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals.

REVERSED AND REMANDED.

King &amp King and Parnell Black, all of Salt Lake City, for appellant.

R. L Beezley and James Devine, both of Salt Lake City, for respondent.

MOFFAT, Justice. STRAUP, C. J., and FOLLAND and EPHRAIM HANSON, JJ., concur. ELIAS HANSEN, Justice, concurring in the order.

OPINION

MOFFAT, Justice.

The complaint in the case in this appeal contains two causes of action. Both sound in trespass, the parties have treated the first cause of action as one for conversion of furniture. The second is for trespass to realty at the time of the alleged conversion of the personal property referred to in the first cause of action.

Damages for the alleged conversion, damages for the alleged trespass, and punitive or exemplary damages are prayed for.

W. H. Adams, the defendant and appellant, is an auctioneer and furniture dealer. He has been engaged in such business in Salt Lake City for about fifteen years. During the month of December, 1930, Sadie Mae Haycraft, wife of respondent, J. I. Haycraft, called Mr. Adams upon the telephone and informed him that she desired to sell her furniture and wanted him to conduct an auction sale at her home at 2619 Highland drive. Mr. Adams arranged to conduct the sale. A few days later Mrs. Haycraft again called Mr. Adams and said: "Mr. Adams, my husband is very ill in the hospital in California. I just received a telegram from him and must go to him immediately. Would you buy the furniture and auction it yourself?"

Mr. Adams replied that he would if it would help her. He then went to her home and examined the furniture, listed it, and placed a valuation on it. He was informed by Mrs. Haycraft that there was a balance due on the purchase price of the piano. Mr. Adams communicated with the music company who held a title retaining contract upon the piano and found there was still $ 120.05 due on the contract, and was informed if he would pay $ 110 it would be accepted as payment in full. Thereupon Mr. Adams paid Mrs. Haycraft $ 300 for the furniture and the music company $ 110 for the piano.

Mrs. Haycraft delivered the key to the residence to Mr. Adams, and authorized him to conduct the sale of the furniture in the home, stating that she was leaving that night. She also requested Mr. Adams to rent the home after the sale, and have the rent paid to a trust company designated by her.

The sale of the furniture was advertised to take place on the 16th day of December, 1930. Mr. Haycraft, the respondent, who had been away from home for six or eight weeks on business, arrived home about 1 o'clock in the morning of December 16th, the day fixed by the advertisement for the sale of the furniture. About 9:30 on the morning of the 16th, when two of appellant's sons went to the Haycraft home to sell or remove the furniture, they found respondent in the home. Up to this point there is no disagreement between the parties. What conflict there is arises from this time on.

Appellant's testimony is to the effect that Mr. Haycraft was rather excited. Respondent was advised that Mr. Adams had purchased the furniture from Mrs. Haycraft; that, in pursuance of the purchase of the furniture and authority given by Mrs. Haycraft to enter the home, the purpose was to proceed with the sale. There is a conflict between the parties as to what was said by them during the period while both were in or about the premises. Respondent testified that he ordered the appellant off the premises. Appellant denies this, and says that respondent tacitly consented and made no objection to the sale and removal of the furniture. Respondent left the premises, and during respondent's absence appellant removed the furniture.

Respondent claims to be the owner of the furniture, asserts his wife had no right or authority to sell it, and insists appellant was a trespasser, and seeks to recover damages as heretofore indicated. The plaintiff recovered judgment. The case was tried to a jury. Upon the close of defendant's case, the defendant moved the trial court for an instructed verdict. Numerous errors are assigned. In the view we take of the case it is not necessary to discuss more than one or two of the assignments.

There was no competent evidence submitted by plaintiff from which the value of the personal property could be determined at the price or value fixed by the jury. The only evidence offered by plaintiff and received by the court related to the cost of the furniture purchased from three to seven years before the time of the alleged conversion. We are not prepared to say that it was reversible error for the court to permit the plaintiff to produce evidence as to the cost of the furniture. Such testimony, however, standing alone, cannot support a verdict. The measure of damages for the conversion of property is the market value, if the property has a market value, at the time of the conversion.

When it came to instructing the jury, the court properly instructed the jury in that regard. The plaintiff produced no evidence from which market value could be deduced, nor was it shown that the property had no market value. Cost of an article, as indicated by the trial court, may be one way, or one of the factors that may be used in a proper case, of getting at the question of market value; but, standing alone, it is not competent evidence. The cost of an article may or may not be the market value at the time of purchase; an article may be purchased for sentimental reasons, or other reasons may enter into a purchase price contract that produces a variance from the market value of articles having a market value. Years of time, use, purpose, and individual elements tend to create a departure from what was once a fair market value of an article. If the property had been destroyed by fire or other casualty, so that the only way a value might be arrived at, might be by way of cost, wear, tear, obsolescence, comparison with like articles of known or ascertainable value at the time of the conversion, when all property connected up may render cost an evidential factor, even then, however, the cost would be of necessity have to bear some definite or ascertainable relation to market value. No such attempts to connect cost with market value were made in this case by plaintiff.

Thus, had the defendant rested his case, upon the close of plaintiff's evidence, and made a motion for a directed verdict for nominal damages only, the court would have been required to instruct the jury upon the basis of the evidence as submitted at that time, and would have been compelled to instruct the jury upon that basis as to the measure of damages.

As heretofore indicated, special cases and exceptional circumstances permit the allowance of a witness to testify as to the cost or price paid or reproduction value of the thing as a starting point; but, unless this is connected by some competent evidence that brings the cost or purchase price into relation with market value except in certain cases of total loss or destruction of property, the evidence of cost or purchase price becomes incompetent and immaterial. This court has been liberal in applying this rule, as will be observed from the following cases: In the case of Smith v. Mine & Smelter Supply Co., 32 Utah 21, 88 P. 683, 685, the action was one for the recovery of damages for injury to and destruction of personal property caused by an explosion. The court there said:

"In permitting evidence of the cost of the article in fixing its value, regard must therefore be had to all the conditions and circumstances; and where the time at which the cost is fixed in view of all the circumstances, is too remote from the time of injury, the cost may not afford any guide whatever, and should not be permitted. In such cases the present market value of the article when new, if it has no other market value, would afford a better guide as a starting-point, and the actual value of the article should be determined by deducting from the cost price such an amount as its past use and wear would reduce its value in comparison to a new article of like kind. But in any case resort to the cost should be had only for the purpose of a starting-point, and as a means to ascertain the true or actual value of the article. It is in this sense that the courts lay down the rule, as we understand it, that cost is some evidence of value, and hence, in a proper case, may be admitted. The object of the law in all cases is to compensate the injured person for his loss--no more, no less. To attain this object, the rule of market value has been adopted as the one more nearly approximating the end in view. There are, however, exceptional cases where the rule cannot be applied to its full extent. When such is the case, the rule is to be followed as nearly as the circumstances of the case permit; but a party is not to be deprived of his property simply because his case may not fall within the regular rule governing the measure of damages. * * *

"The circumstances of this case in respect to proving actual damages were exceptional. It may be true that, if respondent had all the articles that were destroyed by the explosion piled up in her dooryard or house and offered to sell them she might not have realized the amount the jury allowed her. She, however, had them, not for disposal in that way, but for daily use in her home, and we think she was entitled to recover the actual value in accordance with the rules laid down by the court. The cost price was used as a...