Mullen v. Doyle
Mullen v. Doyle
Opinion of the Court
Opinion by
The question of pleading is not important in the case, because, although complainant failed to prove the main ground of his bill, the express agreement and the purchase with the trust funds, as averred in section eight, yet he set out as a ground of relief in section nine the legal incapacity of Doyle to deal with the title to be produced by the sheriff’s sale, because he was trustee. So far as respondents were concerned-this averment of the bill put them upon notice that the validity of Doyle’s acquisition of this title while he was trustee would be questioned, and, of course, that the burden of proof would be upon them to sustain a purchase which, if valid at all, could only be so under some exception to the rule that a trustee shall not have an advantage to himself to the detriment of the trust estate.
Whether the situation which led to the sheriff’s sale was of the trustee’s own making, or whether he could have prevented the sale, are questions of some difficulty, upon which the auditor of the first account and the master in the present suit differed. It is not necessary for us to consider which is right, nor how far the first finding may be conclusive upon the second. Conceding both points to be decided in appellant’s favor, and that, up to the point of the sale, Doyle, as trustee, was within the exception recognized in Fisk v. Sarber, 6 W. & S. 18, there still remain the circumstances of the sale itself, and Dojde’s subsequent conduct in regard to the title. Though there was no express agreement-to purchase for the trust, there is evidence satisfactory to the master and the court below that Simpson believed such was to be the case, and that the conduct of Doyle aided in producing that belief. The master finds ex
• The question of the statute of limitations does not arise. Under the circumstances found by the master, already quoted, the statute did not begin to run until the filing of the account in March, 1885.
Decrees affirmed at cost of appellants.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- Mullen, Trustee v. Doyle
- Cited By
- 1 case
- Status
- Published
- Syllabus
- Trusts and trustees — Purchase by trustee at Ms own sale. Counsel for a mortgagee who was foreclosing the mortgage on certain trust property, informed the trustee that he thought the mortgagee would be glad to have any one take the property who would pay sufficient in cash to leave only the principal of the mortgage debt unpaid. The trustee did not communicate this information to his cestui quo trust, but bought in the property and took title in the name of a third person for himself individually. Held, that the conduct of the trustee was such a failure of his full duty as trustee, as, irrespective of intent and of, any actual fraud, would prevent him from acquiring title for himself as against his cestui que trust. Statute of limitations — Notice to cestui que trust. Where a cestui que trust has no notice of a purchase by his trustee of the trust property until the filing of the trustee’s account in which the rents of the property were omitted, the statute of limitations will not begin to run against the cestui que trust until that date. JSquity — Pleading—Burden of proof. On a bill in equity by a cestui que trust to compel a conveyance of trust property, bought by his trustee in the name of a third person at a sheriff’s sale, a failure to prove the main averments of the bill that there was an express agreement and a purchase with the trust funds, is immaterial where the bill also avers the legal incapacity of the trustee to deal with the title to be foreclosed by the sheriff’s sale, because he was a trustee. In such a ease the averment put the defendant upon notice that the burden of proof would be upon him to sustain the purchase.