Safe Deposit & Trust Co. of Baltimore v. Independent Brewing Ass'n

• Decision Date: 13 January 1916
• Docket Number: 62.
• Citation: 96 A. 617,127 Md. 463
• Parties: SAFE DEPOSIT & TRUST CO. OF BALTIMORE v. INDEPENDENT BREWING ASS'N.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

96 A. 617

127 Md. 463

SAFE DEPOSIT & TRUST CO. OF BALTIMORE v. INDEPENDENT BREWING ASS'N.

No. 62.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

January 13, 1916

Appeal from Superior Court of Baltimore City; Morris A. Soper Judge.

Garnishment by the Independent Brewing Association, a corporation against the Safe Deposit & Trust Company of Baltimore garnishee of Catherine Davis Burt, defendant. From a judgment sustaining the garnishment as to such defendant, the garnishee appeals. Reversed.

C Morris Harrison and Frank Gosnell, both of Baltimore (Robert L. Gill, of Baltimore, on the brief), for appellant.

J. Stanislaus Cook, of Baltimore (Albert R. Stuart, of Baltimore, on the brief), for appellee.

BRISCOE J.

This is an attachment proceeding issued out of the superior court of Baltimore city on the 1st day of March, 1915, on a foreign judgment obtained in the district court for the Eleventh judicial district of the state of Minnesota by the plaintiff against the defendants, and laid in the hands of the Safe Deposit & Trust Company of Baltimore, trustee, as garnishee, of the defendants, Charles B. Burt and Catherine Davis Burt, his wife, nonresident debtors of the state of Maryland. The garnishee appeared and moved to quash the attachment upon the ground that the defendants had no attachable interest in the property mentioned in the proceedings or in the hands of the garnishee, as trustee.

On the 7th of May, 1915, the attachment was dismissed by the appellee as to Charles B. Burt, but the motion as to Catherine D. Burt, the other defendant, was overruled. Thereafter the case was tried upon the plea of nulla bona and a second plea, that the income of the defendant in the trust estates in its hands as trustee under the wills of the testator and testatrix is payable only to her during her life, after the death of her husband, who is at this time alive, and that the interest of the defendant therein is not subject to attachment. The replication filed to these pleas asserts that the garnishee on the day of laying the attachment in its hands had to the value of the sum of $830.19 in the writ of attachment specified of the goods, chattels, and credits of the defendant in its hands, etc.

The case was tried upon the pleadings, an agreed statement of facts, and certain exhibits filed therewith, and from a judgment of condemnation to the extent of $1,093.47, and costs, against the interest of the defendant, in and to property held by the garnishee, as trustee, this appeal has been taken.

The questions in the case are raised upon a single exception, and that is to the refusal of the court to grant the following prayer offered on behalf of the garnishee and the defendant Catherine D. Burt:

"The garnishee prays the court to rule as a matter of law that under the pleadings, the agreed statement of facts, and the exhibits in this case the defendant Catherine Davis Burt has no attachable interest in any property, funds, goods, or chattels now held by the Safe Deposit & Trust Company of Baltimore as trustee under the wills of Alfred P. Burt and Mary E. Burt, and therefore the plaintiff is not entitled to a judgment of condemnation."

The ruling on this exception presents the important question in the case, and we shall first consider whether there was error in refusing this prayer. If as a matter of law, the defendant Catherine D. Burt, under the facts disclosed by the record, had no attachable interest in the property held by the garnishee company, then the plaintiff was clearly not entitled to a judgment of condemnation, and the prayer should have been granted, and not refused.

It is conceded that the interests of Charles B. Burt under the wills of Mr. and Mrs. Burt are not liable to attachment, and cannot be reached by his creditors by any process either at law or equity because by the plain terms of both wills the right to the enjoyment of the income in the hands of the trustee shall be to the exclusion of creditors. Smith v. Towers, 69 Md. 88, 14 A. 497, 15 A. 92, 9 Am. St. Rep. 398; Reid v. Safe Deposit Co., 86 Md. 467, 38 A. 899; Brown v. Macgill, 87 Md. 162, 39 A. 613, 39 L. R. A. 806, 67 Am. St. Rep. 334; Jackson Square v. Bartlett, 95 Md. 661, 53 A. 426, 93 Am. St. Rep. 416.

Coming, then, to the interest of Mrs. Burt, we think it is clear from the language of the will of the testator (and it was agreed for the purposes of this case that the two wills were the same as to the interest) that the defendant Mrs. Burt took an equitable contingent remainder for life under both wills, and that this interest in the hands of the trustee was not subject to attachment.

By the fourth clause of the testator's will it will be seen that he left all the rest and residue of his property to the appellant company in trust for the uses and purposes set out therein. After the death of his wife, who is now dead, he provides as follows:

"And from and immediately after the death of my said dear wife, subject of said annuity to my sister for life as aforesaid, in trust to *** pay into the hands of each of my sons. Charles B. Burt and Henry T. Burt, one equal fourth part of the net income derived from said trust property, or apply the same to the support, and maintenance of my said sons respectively or to the support and maintenance of themselves and their wives and children, as in the judgment of said trustee or its officers, or its successors in trust, shall be most promotive of their best interests; but in no event shall the share of said net income so devised for the use of my said two sons, Charles and Henry and their families, be subject to the order of of my said two sons, nor either of them, nor shall any assignee or grantee of theirs or either of them be entitled to demand or receive their said shares of said net income, nor shall the same at any time be subject to or liable for the payment of any debt or obligation which my said two sons, Charles

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