Parker v. First National Bank
Parker v. First National Bank
Opinion of the Court
This is an action to compel the defendant to account for trust funds and property. Defendant denied possession of any trust funds or property and, as a further defense, pleaded the statute of limitations. The guaranty fund' commission intervened and asserted a right to the trust property by assignment from the plaintiff, but joined with
In April, 1921, the Brown County Bank of Long Pine, then a going concern, was indebted to the defendant in a sum slightly in excess of $40,000 upon three promissory notes, and, to secure the payment of such notes, the Brown County Bank deposited with defendant, as collateral, notes of its customers aggregating in amount nearly $100,000. The Brown County Bank became insolvent, and Parker, the plaintiff, was appointed and qualified as its receiver. A large part of the indebtedness of the Brown County Bank was soon paid by collection of collaterals pledged as security. In September, 1921, the receiver offered to pay defendant the amount still due on the three promissory notes and demanded return of the uncollected collateral then in the possession of defendant. Defendant refused to comply with the request and, under a clause of the agreement pledging the collateral, to the effect that after the payment of the three promissory notes the collateral might be held and applied to any other liability of the Brown County Bank which the defendant might then hold, asserted a right to hold the collateral and the proceeds as security for the payment of other notes! The receiver denied that the other notes were liabilities of the Brown County Bank and, without tendering the amount due upon the notes of the Brown County Bank, brought an action in replevin. No order of replevin was issued, ibut defendant appeared and filed a demurrer to the petition in that action. In July, 1922, after the filing of the replevin action, the balance due the defendant upon the three notes of the Brown County Bank was paid in full from collections out of the collateral. In September, 1922, an agreement was entered into between plaintiff, and defendant that the remaining collateral notes, then in the possession of defendant, should be turned over to the receiver, and that he should make collections on said collateral notes and turn the proceeds of such collections
This statement of fact is substantially taken from the findings made by the district court, and the findings are supported by the record. The trial court determined that the Brown County Bank was not liable on or for the last five notes and that defendant was not authorized to apply the collections from the collateral to the payment of said notes. The court further determined that the agreement made in September, 1922, for the collection of collateral and holding of the proceeds until the liability of the Brown County Bank on these five notes could be determined, and the supplemental agreement, made in December of the same year for the payment of interest on funds arising from the collateral, were a distinct recognition of the obligations of defendant to account for the collateral; that the dismissal of the replevin action without prejudice gave rise to a right of plaintiff to bring this or some other action to secure the determination of the rights between the parties, and against which right the statute of limitations would begin to run only when notice of repudiation of such obligation on defendant’s part should be given the receiver, or the fact of such repudiation otherwise brought to his knowledge, and that the plea of the statue of limitations was unavailing. It further appears from the record that, in addition to the $17,942.19, which had been collected from the collateral by the plaintiff and remitted to the defendant, plaintiff had collected the further sum of $1,271.75, which remained in his possession, and that he still held in his possession thé remaining uncollected collateral notes. The trial court
Counsel for defendant allege that the trial court erred in its ruling that defendant was not entitled to hold and apply the proceeds arising from the collection of the collateral notes to the payment of the five notes, to which reference has hereinfore been made.
Defendant contends that where one bank deposits money to the credit of another bank, and the latter receives and retains the benefits, even if the transaction is in the nature of an excess loan, a liability arises on an implied contract to return or make compensation for the benefits received, and, further, that, although in the ordinary case a bank whose name does not appear on a promissory note may not be sued thereon, yet if the bank receives and retains the benefits of the transaction it may be estopped to deny its liability and required to account for the benefits which it receives.
For the sake of argument, the proposition may be admitted as sound; but in the instant case there is nothing to show that the Brown County Bank received and retained the benefits of the deposits to its credit. For aught that appears, the persons who sent the notes to defendant for discount may have drawn and received from the Brown County Bank the amounts placed to its credit; nor is there anything in the record to disclose that the transactions were, in any sense, those of the Brown County Bank. Nowhere does it appear that any of the five notes were at any time the property of the Brown County Bank, nor that it assumed or incurred any liability to defendant for any of the five notes for which defendant claims to hold the collateral as security.
Defendant also advances the proposition that if, for the purpose of enabling a bank to borrow money without giving its own note, another bank credits the sum to the borrower’s account and takes an individual guaranty from the
In Norfolk Nat. Bank v. First Nat. Bank, 114 Neb. 560, it was held: “One whose name nowhere appears on a negotiable promissory note is not generally chargeable as indorser.” The same rule would apply to a contract of guaranty, unless a separate contract of guaranty was shown to exist. No liability of the Brown County Bank, as maker, indorser, guarantor, or otherwise, on any of these notes is shown. It necessarily follows that the defendant could not lawfully hold the collateral notes, or the proceeds thereof, for the payment of any of the five, notes in question.
It is argued that plaintiff’s cause of action is barred by the statute of limitations. It is insisted that a cause of action arose in favor of plaintiff at the time he offered to pay the balance due upon the three promissory notes, for the security of which the collaterals were pledged, and that at any rate it began to run from the time the action in replevin was instituted.
It is a well-recogn,ized rule that the statute of limitations, will not run against a cause of action until the party asserting it has the right to bring and maintain such action. It is also a well-recognized rule that the pledgor of collateral securities may not institute and maintain an action for the recovery of the pledged collateral until he has first paid the debt for which they were pledged as security, or until he has made a lawful tender of the amount of such debt. In the event of tender, he must keep the tender good, and, when bringing his action, he must bring or tender the amount into court. Jones, Collateral Securities (3d ed.) sec. 570. .
In view of the facts disclosed, it is unnecessary to determine which of these conflicting views is the better. After the replevin action was begun, the parties entered into an agreement, the effect of which was that the defendant should continue to hold and control the collaterals until the question whether the collaterals were holden for other obligations than the three original notes for which they were pledged should be determined in an action in court. It is true that both parties at that time no doubt contemplated that that question would be determined in the then
In Holmes v. Doll, 101 Neb. 156, this court held: “The statute of limitations does not commence to run against an action by the administrator of the estate of a beneficiary, to recover from the trustee the value of notes and mortgages which ‘he has refused to transfer to plaintiff, until the trustee has repudiated his trust and refused to transfer the property.” In Hanson v. Hanson, 78 Neb. 584, it was held that the statute “does not begin to run in favor of the trustee of a resulting trust until such trustee, by some act or declaration, clearly repudiates his trust.” And this ruling was affirmed in Johnson v. Petersen, 100 Neb. 255.
It necessarily follows that the defense of the statute of limitations is not available to defendant. No error has been disclosed.
Judgment affirmed.
Note — See Pledges, 43 A. L. R. 1069; 21 R. C. L. 653; 4 R. C. L. Supp. 1425; 5 R. C. L. Supp. 1167; 6 R. C. L. Supp. 1278; 7 R. C. L. Supp. 715.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- W. F. Parker, Receiver v. First National Bank of Omaha
- Status
- Published