Sannoner v. King

• Decision Date: 02 July 1887
• Parties: SANNONER and another <I>v.</I> KING.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

5 S.W. 327

SANNONER and anotherv.

KING.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

July 2, 1887.

Appeal from circuit court, Pulaski county.

Blackwood & Williams, for appellants. Francis M. Fulk, for appellee.

COCKRILL, C. J

Upon the issue of an execution against him, King filed a schedule of all his property, and obtained a supersedeas. A few weeks afterwards another execution issued upon the same judgment, and was levied upon two mules, which King asserted belonged then, as when he filed his schedule, to his wife. She sued the officer for the possession of the mules. The defense was that they belonged to the defendant in the execution, and had been transferred by him to his wife to defraud his creditors. The issue was determined in favor of the execution creditor. King filed a second schedule of all his property, including the two mules, the total valuation of which was less than the amount the law exempts from seizure under execution. The appellants, who are the execution creditors, resisted the issuance of a second supersedeas, upon the ground that King was estopped from claiming the mules because— First, he had asserted that they were his wife's, and had failed to put them in his first schedule; and, second, because the transfer, though void as to creditors, was binding upon King. The court sustained the right of exemption, and the creditors appealed.

1. The doctrine of estoppel has no application. The appellants' position has been in nowise superinduced or affected by the appellee's conduct, and they have not been injured by it. They are claiming no right under or by virtue of the sham sale, and were not prejudiced by it.

2. The position that the transfer is void as to creditors, but binding between the parties, may be admitted; but the conclusion that the execution creditor shall have the benefit of the fraudulent vendee's bargain, without showing any privity with her, does not follow. It is of no concern to the creditors that the vendee may successfully assert title against the vendor to the property fraudulently transferred. She may do so, or she may abandon her rights under the contract without injury in either case to the creditors, if the property can be claimed by the debtor as exempt from seizure under the appellants' execution. As between the debtor and creditor, in case of a fraudulent conveyance, the vendor is regarded as the owner, and for this reason the creditor may subject the property to the payment of his debt. But the debtor's right to...