Brown v. Perera

Headnote

Brown v. Perera, 182 App. Div. 922 , affirmed.

Appeal, by permission, from a judgment of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the first judicial department, entered February 27, 1918, unanimously affirming a judgment in favor of defendant entered upon the report of a referee. This was an action for conversion of chattels consisting of certain foreign moneys. The complaint stated nine causes of action, to which a tenth was added by amendment during the course of the trial. In the .first eight of these causes of action the complaint alleged that the plaintiffs’ predecessor firm were possessed as of their own property of the foreign moneys in question, viz., 60,500 Italian lire; 20,310 German marks; 100 Austrian kroner; 19,500 French francs; 2,000 Swiss francs and 3,000 Belgian francs; a total value of $21,143.64; that these were wrongfully taken from their possession by one Piptone, an employee of theirs; that they came to the possession of the defendant, who converted them to his own use; that the plaintiffs’ predecessor firm assigned their rights in the premises to the plaintiffs; that the plaintiffs had notified the defendant of the assignment and had demanded the chattels; and that the defendant had refused to deliver any part thereof. The ninth cause of action was similar except that the foreign moneys converted (12,000 Italian lire of the value of $2,316) were the property of the plaintiffs themselves instead of their predecessor firm. The tenth cause of action, inserted during the trial, was similar to the first eight, except that the things converted were 24 Italian lire, 3,000 German marks and 20 Belgian francs of a total value of $1,202.77 and except that conversion was alleged to have been effected not by demand and refusal, but by a disposition by the defendant of the chattels prior to the commencement of the action. The answer set up to all these causes of action was the same, consisting of, first, a general denial,

and second, an affirmative defense of purchase for value without notice by the defendant from Piptone.