Shepherd v. Boggs

• Decision Date: 30 September 1879
• Citation: 2 N.W. 370,9 Neb. 257
• Parties: TRUEMAN H. SHEPHERD, APPELLANT, v. CHARLES T. BOGGS, APPELLEE.
• Court: Nebraska Supreme Court

9 Neb. 257

2 N.W. 370

TRUEMAN H. SHEPHERD, APPELLANT,

v.CHARLES T. BOGGS, APPELLEE.

Supreme Court of Nebraska.

Filed September, 1879.

Appeal from the district court for Lancaster county.Lamb, Billingsley & Lambertson and Harwood & Ames, for appellant.

M. H. Sessions, for appellee.

MAXWELL, C. J.

This action is brought into this court by appeal. In the court below the case was referred to a referee, who found, in substance, that in October, 1875, the plaintiff paid the defendant $900 to be admitted to a half interest in the business of certain insurance companies in the city of Lincoln; that the partnership continued until about the first day of January, 1877, when the defendant excluded the plaintiff from the business, and from access to the books of their agencies, taking them exclusively into his own possession. The referee found a settlement had been made between the parties in October, 1876, and a due-bill given by the defendant to the plaintiff for the amount due, which was excluded from consideration. He also found that the commissions on the business of the firm from October 1, 1876, to December 31st of that year, was the sum of $345.71, and that the expenses was the sum of $31.45, leaving the net receipts the sum of $314.26. The referee also found that the net premium receipts for the year preceeding the dissolution of the agency was the value of the agency, and that such receipts amounted to the sum of $901.36. As a conclusion of law the referee found that the plaintiff was not entitled in the action to an accounting, or to recover on the due-bill, and found that there was due the plaintiff the sum of $167.49 1/2. Exceptions to the report were overruled by the district court, and judgment rendered on the finding. The finding of facts is not objected to by either party, and none of the testimony is preserved in the record. The only question to be determined is the correctness of the conclusions of law of the referee.

The petition is an ordinary one for the dissolution of the partnership, and an accounting. The answer admits many of the allegations of the petition to be true, and alleges that the defendant has, at all times, been ready to settle, and to account with the plaintiff.

That a court of equity has authority in such a case to decree an accounting will not be denied, and having obtained jurisdiction for this purpose, it may retain it for the purpose of doing complete justice between the parties, and to prevent a...