Interstate Chemical Corp. v. Duke

Headnote

Interstate Chemical Corporation v. Duke, 176 App. Div. 684 , affirmed.

Appeal from a judgment of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the first judicial department, entered April 2, 1917, affirming a judgment in favor of defendant entered upon a dismissal of the complaint by the court on trial at Special Term. The complaint charged that the defendant, while occupying confidential relations with the plaintiffs, and engaged with them in a joint venture, fraudulently acquired and now owns all the properties brought to his attention by the plaintiffs in connection with the adventure, except the property of the plaintiffs, in the acquisition of which their entire profit rested, with the result that the plaintiffs can neither themselves conduct the contemplated enterprise nor submit it to others; tha-t the fraud was accomplished by a series of written contracts fraudulently prepared, and their execution fraudulently secured by the defendant acting in collusion with his attorney, who utilized his position of acting for joint adventurers to accomplish what he knew to be the fraudulent purpose of his client. Relief was demanded annulling and canceling two written contracts executed by and between the plaintiffs and the defendant on November 15, 1913, upon the ground that their execution by the plaintiffs had been procured by false and fraudulent representations made by the defendant and Ambrose H. Burroughs, his attorney; that the defendant be directed to specifically perform a contract which it is alleged in the complaint was partly in writing and partly oral, and which contract is alleged to have been made prior to November 15, 1913; that it be adjudged that the defendant holds certain water powers on the Saguenay and Shipshaw rivers in Canada and certain real estate adjacent to such water powers and a certain patented process for the manufacture of fertilizers and combining ammonia and phos

phoric acid and denominated the “ Willson Process ” in trust for the plaintiffs to the extent of a one-fifth interest therein.