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Hodgman v. Barker

43 N.Y. St. Rep. 797 Court N.Y. Gen. Term Decision date 1892-02-18 English

Delivered by Van Brunt, P. J.

Contents

Majority

p. 797
George F. Hodgman, Resp’t, v. Stephen T. Barker, Def’t.
(Supreme Court, General Term, First Department,
Filed February 18, 1892.)

Headnote

1. Execution—Stay.
Notice of intention to apply for a stay of execution will not of itself operate as a stay, and a payment made by the sheriff to the plaintiff’s, attorney after such notice, but before the application is made, is not a violation of an order thereafter granted.
3. Same.
'Prior to the granting of a stay, the sheriff gave to plaintiff’s attorney a check, which the attorney deposited after the order was granted. Held, that such deposit was not an application of the money; that it had been received and applied before the order was granted, and hence was not within the stay which was granted.
8. Attachment—Validity.
An attaching creditor, whose attachment has been held defective, has no-standing to attack the attachment of another creditor.
Appeal by the National Broadway Bank from an order confirming and adopting a referee’s report as to an alleged violation) of an order of the court.
Plaintiff and the bank were attaching creditors of defendant. The hank’s attachment had been held defective by the courts, and thereafter it notified the sheriff that it was about to apply for a.
p. 798
stay pending application to vacate plaintiff’s attachment Before the order.was served, the sheriff gave plaintiff’s attorney a check •which was receipted upon the execution.
W. F. MacRae, for app’lt; L. Skidmore, for resp’t.

Although we do not entirely comprehend the practice by which this appeal is brought before the court without the evidence upon which the court is supposed to have acted in the disposition of the motion in the court below, the report of the referee being merely advisory, and under no circumstances conclusive, yet it having been assumed that an appeal may be brought, we will dispose of the question.

It must, of course, be assumed that all the facts which appear' In the report as contained in the papers are true; and unless it can be shown that there was error in the conclusion arrived at by the court below, these facts being true, the order must be affirmed.

Upon a careful examination of those facts it would appear that thé position of the counsel for the appellant is that the sheriff and the plaintiff’s attorney, having had. notice of his intention to apply for a stay, were thereby stayed until it might be determined as to whether the court should or should not grant his application; and that it is a violation of an order subsequently granted to do an act inconsistent therewith, because notice had been given of the fact that application was to be made for such an order.

We are not aware of any rule by which an order becomes operative before it is made or that a stay of proceedings necessarily follows the notice of the attorney that he is about to apply for the same.

The evidence shows that the money was paid over before any order was made or served and that it had been receipted for upon the execution before the service of any such order, and before the application which is referred to in the order granting the stay had been made. The mere deposit of the check by the attorney in his bank was not an application of the money.' It liad been received and applied before the order was served, and hence was not within the stay which had been granted.

It is urged that the plaintiff’s attachment is void, and that ■therefore the sheriff was. not authorized to act. But even if that were so, how can the appellant here raise any such question? It had been decided and was the law at the time this stay was ■granted that the appellant had no standing in court to attack such attachment; and there is nothing contained in the referee’s findings to show that there had been any change in its position.

It seems to us, therefore, whatever view is to be taken of the ■question presented, that the appellant is not in a position to complain of the payment in question.

The order should be affirmed, with .ten dollars costs and disbursements.

O’Brien and Patterson, JJ., concur.