Meridale Dairies, Inc. v. Dumas

• Decision Date: 30 May 1939
• Citation: 138 Fla. 323,189 So. 391
• Parties: MERIDALE DAIRIES, Inc. v. DUMAS et al.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

189 So. 391

138 Fla. 323

MERIDALE DAIRIES, Inc. v. DUMAS et al.

Florida Supreme Court, Division A.

May 30, 1939

Rehearing Denied June 14, 1939.

Suit by the Meridale Dairies, Inc., against J. S. Dumas and others to require the defendants to pay the amount due the plaintiff from a corporation to which it had sold merchandise. From a judgment of dismissal, the plaintiff appeals.

Judgment affirmed. Appeal from Circuit Court, Dade County; H. F. Atkinson, judge.

COUNSEL

Gramling & Gramling, of Miami, for appellant.

Herbert U. Feibelman, of Miami, for appellees.

OPINION

TERRELL Chief Justice.

In the latter part of 1935, Meridale Dairies, Inc., a New York corporation, doing business in New Jersey, sold to Holsum Atlantic Corporation, a New Jersey corporation, $2,165.96 in merchandise. Holsum Atlantic Corporation owned and operated a cafeteria in Atlantic City, New Jersey, which failed. Meridale Dairies, Inc., then filed suit and secured a judgment against Holsum Atlantic Corporation, in New Jersey which it has not been able to collect.

J. S Dumas and B. T. Dumas, Jr., residents and citizens of Florida, own and operate cafeterias in St. Petersburg and Miami, Florida. J. S. Dumas and B. T. Dumas Jr., were also the owners of Holsum Atlantic Corporation against which Meridale Dairies, Inc., secured its judgment and which failed.

The bill of complaint in this suit prays that the corporate fiction of Holsum Atlantic Corporation be disregarded and that J. S. Dumas and B. T. Dumas, Jr., be decreed to be the real persons indebted to appellant and that they be required to pay the $2,165.96 due it from Holsum Atlantic Corporation as soon as reduced to judgment in this State. A motion to dismiss the bill of complaint was granted and this appeal was prosecuted.

The gist of appellant's contention is that J. S. Dumas and B. T. Dumas, Jr., were the principal owners of the New Jersey corporation which failed, that they have organized several corporations of Florida which have acquired the assets of the New Jersey corporation, that they are personally responsible for the debts of the latter and should be required to pay the same.

There is no quarrel with the principle of law contended for but the facts alleged in the bill of complaint fail to make out a case on which the desired judgment can be predicated. The chancellor treated the bill of complaint as a creditor's bill and granted the motion to...