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180 Ala. 98

Morris & Co. v. Barton

Supreme Court of Alabama

Decided November 21, 1912

Supreme Court of Alabama · decided 1912-11-21

Heard before Hon. W. W. Whiteside. Bill by Morris & Company and others against Barton & Allen and others to set aside a conveyance as a fraud on creditors. From a decree denying the relief prayed complainants appeal. The prayer for a personal decree against Barton and others is authorized.- — Met-calf v. Arnold, 132 Ala. 74.

Relies on Beall & Coston v. Lehman Durr Co. · Dickinson v. National Bank of the Republic · Metcalf v. Arnold

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Affirmed · Decided 1912-11-21

How this case has been cited

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently June 1966

7 state decisions

20191219201930194019501960decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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DOWDELL, O. J.

¶1This is a creditors’ bill to set aside an alleged fraudulent conveyance by the debtor.

¶2While there are assignments of error on the ruling of the chancellor on demurrer to the bill as originally filed, these assignments are not insisted on in argument, and are therefore, under the rule, not considered.

¶3The answers of the respondents to the bill as amended expressly deny every material averment of fraud. The question presented for our consideration, and the only one insisted on in argument, is purely one of fact. There is no difficulty in the law, as stated in the cases of Metcalf et al. v. Arnold, 132 Ala. 74, 32 South. 763, Beall & Coston v. Lehman, Durr Co., 110 Ala. 446, 18 South. 230, and Dickinson v. Bank of the Republic, 98 Ala. 546, 14 South. 550, but the difficulty with the complainants here rests in the failure of proof to support the averments of fraud.

¶4The law does not presume fraud, and when a charge of fraud is made as a fact,, and is denied, it must be established by the evidence before relief can be had. The evidence in the present case has been carefully considered and it would serve no purpose to here go over *100it in detail, and we are of the opinion that it falls far short of sustaining the allegations of fraud made in the bill.

¶5It is shown without dispute in the evidence that the price paid by Barton & Allen for the stock of goods was fair, and not disproportionate, but a reasonable market value. And it is further shown without dispute that the proceeds of the sale of the stock was paid to the creditors. This rebuts any presumption of an intent on the part of the debtor to defraud his creditors in making the sale'. The fact that some of the creditors received none of the proceeds does not constitute fraud, if the proceeds .went to other creditors, as a debtor may prefer one creditor over another without being guilty, in so doing, of a fraud that would authorize a bill to set aside the conveyance as fraudulent and void against creditors.

¶6We concur in the conclusion of the chancellor that the evidence fails to support the bill and the decree appealed from must be here affirmed.

¶7Affirmed.

All the Justices concur.
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