Crawford v. Davis
Crawford v. Davis
Opinion of the Court
A. J. Davis, the appel-lee herein, sued the appellant, Miner Crawford, and the Amarillo Securities Investment Company, a corporation, alleging the execution and delivery of a certain $1,000 note, payable to the order of the Investment Company, and indorsed by it to him, for a valuable consideration. The defendant Crawford answered that the Securities Investment Company, to whom the note sued upon was made payable, was a corporation organized solely *437 for the purpose of promoting the Bankers’ Trust Company of Amarillo, Tex., and that said' Investment Company, through its agent, sold stock and took subscriptions to the capital stock of said Bankers’ Trust .Company; that one J. D. Wrather, an agent of the Securities Investment Company, solicited from him a purchase of shares of stock in the Bankers’ Trust Company; and that the consideration for the note was a certificate representing 50 shares of the capital stock on the said Bankers’ Trust Company, alleged to have been a corporation under the laws of Arizona, with a permit to do business in the state of Texas. It was further alleged in the answer that plaintiff, Davis, at the time he acquired the note sued upon, purchased the same at such an unusual discount, of approximately 40 per cent., with the knowledge of defendant’s solvency, that he was upon notice of the illegality of said note and was not an innocent purchaser for value.
The note, as stated, was payable to the order of the Amarillo Securities Investment Company, and contains the following stipulation:
“As collateral security for the foregoing note, and other notes, if any, this day given for stock, hereinafter named, and [have] delivered to the Amarillo Securities Investment Company, the following securities: Fifty shares of the- capital stock of the Bankers’ Trust Company of .Amarillo, Texas.”
Miner Crawford, the appellant, testified that at the time he executed the note he delivered the same to Mr. Wrather. He said:
“Mr. Wrather came to my house about October 10th T1913] and claimed to be selling stock in the Bankers’ Trust Company of Amarillo.”
He said that Wrather claimed that the organization of the company was to protect and take care of its stockholders and home people in the matter of loans. He further testified:
“I subscribed for the stock because I thought it would put me in position to get money at a cheap rate of interest and a sufficient amount to handle a string of cattle, which otherwise I could not get at a local bank. * * * At the time I siCbseribecl for the stoeh I was informed that I could get a loan, etc. I suppose that I signed a written subscription to buy stock. I signed some kind of a contract. The note was given to secure my subscription to the stock.”
It is often that one company is an organization, or promoting, company for another. The appellant, after testifying as to representations of Wrather that certain persons were stockholders in the Bankers’ Trust Company, as an inducement to him to take the stock, further testified:
“The other inducement which caused me to subscribe for stock was that he agreed to furnish any amount of money the. stockholders would require, or that they would need.”
The appellant also advances the proposition that because Davis, the appellee, gave only two-thirds of the face value of the note in purchasing the same, with knowledge of the solvency of the maker, a short time before the maturity of the note, puts him upon inquiry of its invalidity. The primary questions are whether the stock was delivered by the Bankers’ Trust Company, through the medium of the Securities Company, in consideration of the note, or whether negotiated by the Securities Company, in consideration of the same note? If the former condition exists, the note would be void, irrespective of notice. If the latter condition exists, the note is valid, and the amount paid is immaterial, as the defense of- fraud was not sustained. '
The judgments against the Amarillo Securities Investment Company and Mark Logan, as indorsers, are not complained of, and are affirmed. The judgment against Miner Crawford is reversed and remanded for a new trial.
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Reference
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