State ex rel. Dean Automatic Telegraph Co. v. Southern
| Decision Date | 10 November 1924 |
| Citation | 267 S.W. 422,218 Mo.App. 266 |
| Parties | STATE ex rel. DEAN AUTOMATIC TELEGRAPH COMPANY et al., Petitioners, v. ALLEN C. SOUTHERN, Judge, et al., Respondents. |
| Court | Kansas Court of Appeals |
WRIT DENIED.
Charles E. Summers for petitioners.
Dickinson & Hillman for respondents.
Original Proceeding in Prohibition.
This is an original proceeding in prohibition. Petitioners seek to prevent Hon. Allen C. Southern, one of the Judges of the Jackson county circuit court, from doing certain acts hereinafter mentioned, which are alleged to be beyond his jurisdiction, because not within the pleadings of the case in which the acts are proposed to be done.
It seems that the Dean Automatic Telegraph Company is a corporation owning, among its other assets, a patent for the better sending of telegraphic dispatches, the device being so arranged that the message sent is written out on a typewriter machine and as this is being done, an automatic machine at the receiving station records or writes out the message so that the same is ready for delivery. This patent is said to be one of great value.
At the June Term, 1924, several stockholders of the Dean Automatic Telegraph Company brought a suit in equity for and in behalf of themselves and all other stockholders, alleging among many other things that said corporation entered into a contract with the American Trading and Securities Company to act as the former's fiscal agent in various of its corporate affairs; that the affairs of said corporation have been mismanaged, and the Trading and Securities Company has violated its contract, and praying for an injunction forbidding many specified acts, and further praying that "a receiver be appointed by the court to take charge of the business, effects, property, moneys, books, papers patent papers, plans, specifications and drawings of every kind and character belonging to the said Dean Company, to collect and preserve its property and effects, and to manage its affairs under the orders of this court . . ."
On the 15th of March, 1924, the court issued a temporary injunction and on April 21, 1924, appointed a temporary receiver (which appointment was afterwards, upon a hearing, made permanent) and said receiver duly qualified and took charge of all of the affairs and assets of said Dean Automatic Telegraph Company. At the hearing on which the appointment of the receiver was made permanent, the court found that one of the defendants was in possession of certain of the property of said corporation including "mechanical devices, plans specifications and blue prints, patents and papers pursuant to procuring patents," etc., and ordered him to turn it all over to the receiver, who was ordered to assemble and hold the same together with all machines constructed by said Dean Automatic Telegraph Company.
The receiver duly filed a petition for order of sale in which was contained an inventory of all property of said corporation which had come into his hands consisting of a lot of tools, machinery and furniture, and stating it was kept in a certain storeroom the rental of which was $ 175 per month; that the machinery was depreciating and decreasing in value; that no accounts or moneys owing to, or owned by the corporation had been discovered or received, and no money on hands to pay debts, and praying for an order of sale of "the abovementioned machinery and personal property." A motion was filed by those who are petitioners herein for the writ of prohibition, opposing the sale of said property which motion the court heard and overruled.
The court then found that the personal property listed in the receiver's application for sale belonged to the Dean Automatic Telegraph Company; that the receiver had no means with which to pay rents or debts, that expenses are...
To continue reading
Request your trial