91 N.Y.S. 794 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1905
This action is a consolidation of four separate actions brought to declare void for fraud as many transfers off policies of insurance upon the life of Luther R. Marsh, plaintiff’s testator, made by him to Clarissa J. Huyler, testatrix of the defendants. As to the perpetration of the fraud we are in hearty accord with .the views of the learned court below, which remarked at. the close of the trial that the evidence is overwhelming that the assignments were obtained by the testatrix of the defendants by the grossest and . wickedest of fraud. Among, the findings is to be found' this: “ That the said assignments of said insurance policies on the life of said Luther R. Marsh were procured by said Clarissa J. Huyler by gross fraud and misrepresentation.”
Clarissa J." Huyler was the wife/ff the plaintiff and they lived together; Luther R.- Marsh resided in . their household for some years prior to his death. ■ Mrs. Huyler pretended to be a spiritualistic medium in whom Mr. Marsh believed and whose every sugges- , tian lie followed so long as she. made it .appear to come through her from certain spirits. Mrs. Huyler died in April,. 1901, and Mr:
The learned trial court found “ that the said John J. Huyler was not a believer in spiritualism and well knew that the statements and .pretensions of his said wife were wholly false and Were made for the purpose of defrUuditig the said Marsh and to secure from him for the benefit of the said Clarissa J. Huyler and her said husband money and property belonging to the said Luther R. Marsh,” and that the plaintiff was present when his wife fraudulently obtained the assignments of the policies from Mr. Marsh. And in its remarks at the close of the case it said: “ But the evidence is overwhelming that they were obtained by the grossest and wickedest of frauds. This plaintiff was a party to it; a consénting party to it. He was just as much one of the perpetrators of it as his wife was, and as he is. the person to be benefited by the success of this action a court of equity washes its hands of it.” The court has said that even though the assignments were obtained by fraud and had no legal life and even though .the plaintiff sués in his representative capacity as executor under the will of the deceased assignor, yet the action to annul the assignments may not be maintained, for the plaintiff alone will benefit by a judgment in his favor. We hold the view that the burden was upon the defendants to show that the plaintiff alone would be entitled to the benefit of such a judgment and that the mere evidence of the contents of Mr. Marsh’s will that the plaintiff was his sole legatee was not sufficient, and that because of the failure to sustain that burden the defendants have not avoided the consequences of. the dual capacity of the plaintiff, the one as trustee and the other as an individual legatee, in the former of which he sues.
It is doubtless true that one may not, in equity, where he alone is to be benefited, obtain to his exclusive use, by invoking in a representative capacity, what he would not be entitled to in his individual capacity. This principle seems to underlie the decision in Woodbridge v. Bockes (170 N. Y. 596), where, in denying the plaintiff’s right to an accounting by the defendant, the .court says (p. 602),: “ It is true that the plaintiff is suing in her capacity as trustee, alone; but the court will look through the form of the proceeding, at the substance of thé matter. It will consider whether the facts disclosed are such as to justify her, in any aspect, in appealing to the exercise of its equitable powers. * * * What right" has she to call him to account? By an impersonal right? But that means-that notwithstanding her complicity in the course which has led to this result, if disastrous to the trust, she may be recognized in her assumed office of trustee and may be accorded a right, which, personally, she has forfeited, morally as well as legally. That cannot be. However separate the office and the individual, a court of. equity cannot, and should not, grant to the former what the incumbent is unfit to be trusted with. Herein is the flaw, which deprives the plaintiff’s assertion of an equitable right of any force.”
Bartlett, Woodward and Jenks, JJ., concurred ; Hi-rsohberg, P. J., concurred in result.
Judgment reversed and new trial granted, costs to abide the final award of costs. ' ' .