264 Pa. 105 | Pa. | 1919
Opinion by
On December 2, 1914, Mary M. Hatcher executed a deed to her son, Charles W. Hatcher, for certain real estate situated in the City of Philadelphia. She died a year later, and in her will, duly admitted to probate, her son, Clifford, and her two daughters, Mabel B. and Florence D., now Mrs. Kreibel, were named as residuary legatees and devisees. Upon the refusal of their brother, Charles, to convey to them the real estate for which he holds the deed from their mother, this proceeding was instituted by them to compel him to do so, on the ground that the equitable title remained in her at the time of her death, and passed to them as her residuary devisees. The averment in their bill asking for a decree that the defendant be ordered to convey the premises to them, is that the said Mary M. Hatcher, being seized of the premises in question, “executed a deed of conveyance to her
It seems that Mrs. Hatcher conveyed the real estate to her son, Charles, for what she regarded as a measure of self-protection. She had incurred certain liabilities for another son, and felt that she might avoid incurring any more by making the conveyance to the son, Charles. It is to be fairly found from the testimony that this was the reason the conveyance was made.
The decree of the court below followed the finding “that the said Mary M. Hatcher, being so seized [of the premises in question] executed a deed of conveyance to her son, Charles W. Hatcher, on the second day of December, 1914; that said conveyance was without consideration and was made and executed by the said Mary
The title procured by the appellant from his mother undoubtedly passed to him by reason of her confidence in him, and, upon Ms abuse of that confidence, in refusing to reconvey, the property, as part of her estate at the time of her death, passing to the appellees, he converted himself into a trustee ex maleficio. “The statute which was intended to prevent frauds turns against Mm as the perpetrator of a fraud”: Sechrist’s App., 66 Pa. 237. The broken agreement or promise of the appellant was made at the time his mother executed the deed to Mm and was the inducement to its execution; and if he could now
The court below found that in August, 1915, appellant’s mother verbally assented to his retention of the property as his own, and this finding is urged as a reason for the reversal of the decree. It was coupled with the additional finding that “the evidence as to what the consideration was for the release of the trust under which Charles held the property is vague and far from being clear, precise and indubitable, and no change of possession of the real estate was made.” The defendant never had possession of the premises in question; his mother, during her lifetime, collected the rents, made the repairs and paid the taxes, and after her death, her executrix did the same. At no time, either before or after her death, did the appellant ever ask for an accounting of the rents. This being the situation, the verbal agreement by the mother that her equitable interest in the premises should merge with the legal title in her son, is within the statute of frauds, for “it has been uniformly held that an equitable interest is an interest in land which comes within the words and spirit of the Statute of Frauds......Contracts for the equitable stand now beyond a doubt upon the same footing as contracts for the legal interests”: Meason v. Kaine, 63 Pa. 335, 339.
The assignments of error are all overruled and the decree is affirmed, at appellant’s costs.