John Callan and Michael Callan, Appellants v. Charles Statham and Others

• Decision Date: 01 December 1859
• Parties: JOHN F. CALLAN AND MICHAEL P. CALLAN, APPELLANTS, v. CHARLES W. STATHAM AND OTHERS
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

64 U.S. 477

23 How. 477

16 L.Ed. 532

JOHN F. CALLAN AND MICHAEL P. CALLAN, APPELLANTS, v. CHARLES W. STATHAM AND OTHERS.

December Term, 1859

THIS was an appeal from the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Columbia.

The facts of the case are stated in the opinion of the court.

It was argued by Mr. Walter S. Cox and Mr. Davis for the appellants, and by Mr. Chilton and Mr. Davidge for the appellees.

The arguments and points of law were very dependent upon the facts of the case, and are therefore omitted.

Mr. Justice NELSON delivered the opinion of the court.

This is an appeal from a decree of the Circuit Court of the District of Columbia.

The suit below was a creditor's bill, filed by Statham and others, the appellees, to set aside a deed made by J. F. Callan and wife to M. P. Callan, on the 16th October, 1854, conveying lot No. 8, in square No. 456, with the improvements, in the city of Washington, and to subject it to the payment of the plaintiffs' judgments.

Judgments to an amount exceeding $3,000 were recorded against J. F. Callan, 5th May, 1855. The deed was recorded 14th April, 1855.

A second bill was filed against the same parties and others, on the 9th August, 1856, by Austin Sherman, a judgment creditor of J. F. Callan, for the purpose of setting aside the same deed, and subjecting the property to the payment of his judgments recovered 2d April, 1855, and exceeding in amount $9,000.

The two suits were consolidated, as the same proofs were equally applicable in respect to the charge of fraud in the execution of the conveyance sought to be set aside. The court below decreed that the deed was fraudulent as against creditors, and directed the property to be sold, and the proceeds brought into court for distribution. The case is here on an appeal from that decree.

At the date of the deed of October, 1854, Callan was heavily in debt—several suits impending over him and maturing to judgments, to which the property in question would have been subject. The conveyance was made to a brother, for the consideration, as stated in the deed, of $4,900. The premises conveyed, according to the estimate of witnesses who were well acquainted with them, were worth at the time exceeding $15,000, assuming the title to be good, which will be noticed hereafter. The vendor continued to possess and occupy the property after the conveyance the same as before, leasing the buildings and collecting the rents in his own name, and not accounting to the vendee for the same. Indeed, the vendee seems to have taken no part in the management of the property; nor does it appear that he has exercised any act of ownership over it since the purchase, and down to the taking of the proofs in these cases.

In the answer of Callan, the vendor, to the bill of Statham and others, to the charge that the consideration mentioned in the deed was not paid, he simply states that it had been fully paid by his brother, the vendee. The vendee, for his answer, adopts the answer of his co-defendant.

In their answer to the bill of Sherman, they concur in stating that $4,000 of the consideration were paid by the surrender of a note the vendee held against the other party, and $900 in cash, and that the payment was not made in presence of any third person.

No proof was given...