Morgan v. Citizens' Bank of Spring Hope

• Decision Date: 07 October 1925
• Docket Number: 54.
• Citation: 129 S.E. 585,190 N.C. 209
• Parties: MORGAN v. CITIZENS' BANK OF SPRING HOPE.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

129 S.E. 585

190 N.C. 209

MORGAN v. CITIZENS' BANK OF SPRING HOPE.

No. 54.

Supreme Court of North Carolina

October 7, 1925

Appeal from Superior Court, Nash County; Sinclair, Judge.

Suit by C. D. Morgan against the Citizens' Bank of Spring Hope. From a judgment of nonsuit, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Customer seeking to hold lessor of safety deposit box liable as insurer, must allege and prove special contract.

Evidence held to establish prima facie case for depositor of bonds stolen from safety deposit box.

Action to recover of defendant the value of certain unregistered Liberty Loan bonds, owned by plaintiff, and placed by him in a safety deposit box, rented from defendant, for the safe-keeping of valuable papers and securities. Said safety deposit box was one of many similar boxes, placed and kept in the vault, in defendant's bank building, and rented to its customers. On November 6, 1920, plaintiff called at defendant's bank, and then and there demanded the delivery to him of said bonds. Defendant failed to deliver same to plaintiff in accordance with said demand, and has since failed to deliver said bonds to plaintiff. In his complaint, plaintiff alleges that said bonds were lost destroyed, or taken from defendant's bank, on November 5 1920, as "the result of defendant's carelessness negligence, imprudence, and incautiousness in protecting, keeping, and preserving said bonds."

The vault in defendant's banking house, in which said safety deposit box was placed and kept, was entered during the night of November 5, 1920, by burglars. Said burglars, by means of high explosives, blew open the steel door of said vault, and violently and forcibly broke open various of the safety deposit boxes therein, and took and removed therefrom the contents of said safety deposit boxes. Each of said safety deposit boxes was provided with a lock, the key to which was delivered to the customer at time the said box was rented to him. The locks of all said safety deposit boxes, however, were controlled by a master key which was retained by defendant. The key to each box was retained by the individual customer to whom same was rented. No safety deposit box could be unlocked and opened without the use of both the individual key, which was in the possession of the customer, and the master key, which was in possession of defendant. Defendant did not know, and had no means of knowing, the contents of the several safety deposit boxes in the said vault. As a result of the burglary, many valuable papers and securities were stolen from said safety deposit boxes by the burglars, none of which have been recovered by defendant. Defendant, in its answer, expressly denied that it was negligent with respect to said safety deposit boxes or with respect to the contents of the same; it denied that the said burglary was the result of any negligence on its part, and expressly alleged that its bank building was equipped with "standard modern steel and concrete vaults and with all other reasonable, approved, and accepted devices and equipment to assure safety from fire and to protect, as far as might be, from theft and burglary"; that the safety deposit boxes provided for its customers were placed inside 'its steel-doored, concrete, safety-locked vault"; and that "on the night of November 5, 1920, the defendant's bank vault, safes, and doors, having all been theretofore securely locked and bolted with combination safety locks, burglars, apparently professionals and highly skilled in the use of high explosives, with dynamite, nitroglycerine, T. N. T., or some other powerful explosives, blew out the heavy steel door of the bank's vault and effected an entrance thereto; that they then violently and forcibly broke open various of the safety deposit boxes" and stole the contents of same.

At close of evidence offered by plaintiff, defendant moved for judgment as of nonsuit. This motion was denied, and defendant excepted. Defendant then offered evidence. At the close of all the evidence, defendant renewed its motion for judgment as of nonsuit. Motion allowed. From judgment in accordance with said motion, plaintiff appealed. The only assignment of error is based upon the judgment as of nonsuit.

I. T. Valentine, of Spring Hope, and E. B. Grantham, of Rocky Mount, for appellant.

Spruill & Spruill, of Rocky Mount, Finch & Vaughan, of Nashville, and O. B. Moss, of Spring Hope, for appellee.

CONNOR J.

Plaintiff insists that there was error in allowing defendant's motion for judgment as of nonsuit, and in rendering judgment in accordance with said motion, for the reason: First, that there was evidence of a special contract between plaintiff and defendant, by virtue of which defendant became responsible as an insurer for the safe-keeping and return of said bonds; second, that the relationship of plaintiff and defendant, with respect to said bonds was that of bailor and bailee; and that, as the evidence tended to show that the bonds, the property of plaintiff, were delivered by him into the possession of defendant, under a contract of bailment, and that defendant had failed to return them to plaintiff, upon his demand, the burden was upon defendant to establish by evidence facts which, under the law, relieved him of liability for the return of the bonds or for damages for failure to return same.

The decided weight of authority is to the effect that the relationship between a bank and its customer, resulting from the rental by the former to the latter of a safety deposit box, with respect to the contents of said box, placed therein for safe-keeping, is that of bailor and bailee, the bailment being for hire or mutual benefit. Trustees of Elon College v. Elon Banking & Trust Co., 182 N.C. 298, 109 S.E. 6, 17 A. L. R. 1205. The fact that the safety deposit box can be unlocked and opened, and access had to its contents, only by the joint action of the customer, who has possession of the individual key, and of the bank, which has possession of the master key, does not affect the character of the relationship. The ownership of the property deposited in the safety deposit box remains in the customer. Under the contract, it must be kept in the place designated and agreed upon by the parties, to which access can be had only by their joint action. The place in which the property shall be kept is not to be determined solely by the bank. This is the only element of the contract which seems to differentiate it from a pure bailment as defined by the text-writers and approved by judicial decisions. Hale on Bailments; Dobie on Bailments; 3 R. C. L. 72; 6 C.J. 1084. This element is not sufficient to affect the relationship between the parties, and it must be held, both upon authority and upon principle, that the relationship between the parties to this action, with respect to the bonds, was that of bailor and bailee, for mutual benefit. Cussen v. Southern California Savings Bank, 133 Cal. 534, 65 P. 1099, 85 Am. St. Rep. 221; Reading Trust Co. v. Thompson, 254 Pa. 333, 98 A. 953; Safe Deposit Co. v. Pollock, 85 Pa. 391, 27 Am. Rep. 660; National Safe Deposit Co. v. Stead, 250 Ill. 584, 95 N.E. 973, Ann. Cas. 1912B, 430; Young v. Bank, 150 Tenn. 451, 265 S.W. 681; Trainer v. Saunders, ...