Portland Nat. Bank v. Brooks

• Decision Date: 09 June 1927
• Citation: Portland Nat. Bank v. Brooks, 126 Me. 251, 137 A. 641 (Me. 1927)
• Parties: PORTLAND NAT. BANK v. BROOKS et al.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

137 A. 641

PORTLAND NAT. BANK

v. BROOKS et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

June 9, 1927.

Appeal from Supreme Judicial Court, Cumberland County, in Equity.

Interpleader by the Portland National Bank against Helen G. Brooks and Harry H. Wilson, administrator of the estate of Mary G. Wilson, deceased. From a decree for the first named-claimant, the administrator appeals. Reversed and remanded.

Argued before WILSON, C. J., PHILBROOK, DUNN, DEASY, BARNES, BASSETT, JJ.

Charles J. Nichols, of Portland, for appellant Wilson.

Lauren M. Sanborn, of Portland, for appellee Brooks.

Sydney B. Larrabee, of Portland, for Portland Nat. Bank.

BARNES, J. In this bill of interpleader, brought by the bank, and before this court on appeal from the decree of a single justice, the parties concerned financially are Helen G. Brooks, sole sister and heir at law of Mary G. Wilson, deceased, intestate, and Harry H. Wilson, widower and administrator of the estate of said Mary G. Wilson.

At the decease of the intestate, the bank held a deposit to the credit of Mary G. Wilson and Helen G. Brooks, above named, "payable to either or the survivor," and later, after hearing, the justice decreed that the deposit, less costs in this action to be taxed for the bank, should be paid to Helen G. Brooks.

From this decree the administrator appealed. The learned justice who issued the decree gave no expression of his reasoning or of the facts upon which he founded the decree, and his decision, in view of the law of this state as recently reviewed and expounded in Garland, appellant, 126 Me. 84, 136 A. 459, seems clearly erroneous.

The facts, briefly stated, are as follows:

The deposit in question was instituted many years ago while Mary G. Wilson was a resident of Portland, in this state.

In the early spring of 1925 Mrs. Wilson was living in Newark, N. J., and Mrs. Brooks in Wallaston in Massachusetts.

Mrs. Wilson was suffering from a malignant disease, and, upon the invitation of Mrs. Brooks, was taken to the home of the latter, to receive treatment from a Boston physician, her husband remaining in New Jersey, where his business was located.

At the request of Mrs. Wilson the bank mailed to her an order that the name of her deposit be changed to the form recited above, and such order, duly signed, was received by the bank shortly after June 25, 1925, by it accepted and acted upon.

Two withdrawals from the deposit were made during the illness of Mrs. Wilson, the latter on August 6, 1925, and on the 17th of that month Mrs....