121 N.E. 858 | NY | 1918
The action is to secure a judgment establishing and foreclosing a lien claimed by the plaintiff as a livery stable keeper, under section
The section 183 provides: "A person keeping a livery stable, or boarding stable for animals, or pasturing or boarding one or more animals, or who in connection therewith keeps or stores any wagon, truck, cart, carriage, vehicle or harness, has a lien dependent upon the possession upon each animal kept, pastured or boarded by him, and upon any wagon, truck, cart, carriage, vehicle or harness, of any kind or description, stored or kept provided an express or implied agreement is made with the owners thereof, whether such owner be a mortgagor remaining in possession or otherwise, for the sum due him for the care, keeping, boarding or pasturing of the animal, or for the keeping or storing of any wagon, truck, cart, carriage, vehicle and harness, under the agreement, and may detain the animal or wagon, truck, cart, carriage, vehicle and harness accordingly, until such sum is paid." *516
From the decision of the trial justice it appears: The plaintiff, keeping a livery stable in the borough of Brooklyn, boarded horses and kept trucks and harnesses, under an express agreement with Walter E. Dunn, the mortgagor of the property and the predecessor of Mary A. Dunn, from April 1, 1914, to July 30, 1914. At the beginning of and through that period the defendant Ficke held a valid and duly filed mortgage on the property. On July 17, 1914, the plaintiff, Dunn and Ficke came together and concluded that Dunn owed the plaintiff, because of the boarding and keeping, twelve hundred dollars and eight cents. Dunn then paid three hundred forty dollars and eight cents and in the presence of Ficke, in consideration that the plaintiff would not foreclose his claimed lien, agreed with the plaintiff that he, Dunn, would permit the property to remain at the plaintiff's stable and when he used it in the daytime would return it at night to the stable; he also executed and delivered to the plaintiff, for the further protection of his lien, in the presence of Ficke, a chattel mortgage, in the form of a bill of sale, which was duly filed, of the property as security for the payment of the balance of eight hundred and sixty dollars. The plaintiff agreed not to demand the payment of the sum secured by the mortgage for one year, provided Dunn paid the current subsequent charges for the board and care of the property. On July 30, 1914, Dunn took the property, for use in his business, from and did not return it to the stable of the plaintiff, but took it to the stable of Ficke, with the consent of Ficke, but without the plaintiff's consent, and the property was boarded and kept at Ficke's stable until seized and sold by the sheriff in this action. Dunn used the property, while at the plaintiff's stable, in his business and returned it to the stable for the nights and when not in use. Until October 22, 1914, when Ficke, without the consent of the plaintiff or Dunn, assumed *517 absolute possession of the property and refused to Dunn the further use of it, Dunn treated the property in the same manner. On July 30, 1914, Dunn owed the plaintiff ten hundred fifty-six dollars and eighty-two cents. Ficke boarded and kept the property from July 30, 1914, to and including November 29, 1914, without being paid for any part of said period, except for the month of August, which was paid for by said Dunn, and claimed a lien in the sum of one thousand and thirty-eight dollars and ninety-eight cents. On November 30, 1914, the plaintiff instituted this action and the sheriff seized the property under the writ of seizure issued in it, and on December 14, 1914, sold it pursuant to the order of the court for the gross sum of twenty-three hundred and fifty-three dollars, and now has the net proceeds of the sale. The trial court decided that the plaintiff lost, as to Ficke, his lien as the keeper of the stable, by voluntarily delivering possession of the property to Dunn from day to day, notwithstanding Dunn's agreement that such delivery should not destroy it; that under his mortgage he was entitled to the amount of his claim, to wit, ten hundred and fifty-six dollars and eighty-two cents, and adjudged that the avails of the property be paid in this manner: To Ficke, the sum unpaid on his chattel mortgage, found by him to be eight hundred and eighty-three dollars and forty-six cents, the increase of which sum to nine hundred and forty-three dollars and thirty-five cents constituted the modification of the judgment by the Appellate Division; to the plaintiff, the sum unpaid on his chattel mortgage, that is, ten hundred and fifty-six dollars and eighty-two cents; each payment to be with interest from the date of the judgment, and to Mary A. Dunn, the balance.
We will determine, now, whether or not the plaintiff had at the commencement of the action a lien as the keeper of the livery stable. The sole source of such a *518
lien is the statute. The common law did not extend to keepers of livery stables the doctrines giving rise to the liens of innkeepers, and of bailees for hire, who by their labor and skill impart additional value to the goods delivered to them. The legislative intention, as expressed in the section 183 must be ascertained and followed. It is certain that Dunn, the mortgagor of the property and possessor of the equity of redemption, had the right and authority to enter into the agreement with the plaintiff that the latter should board and keep the property. (Barrett Manufacturing Company v. Van Ronk,
Unless the language compels we will not regard a statute as purposeless. It is always presumed, in regard to a statute, that a result, reasonable and enforcible, was intended by it. (Travelers Insurance Company v. Padula Company, Inc.,
Under the findings, the giving of the chattel mortgage by Dunn to the plaintiff and the making of the agreement as to the payment of the sum due the plaintiff, on July 17, 1914, did not destroy the lien. (Wiles Laundering Co. v. Hahlo,
Under the established law of this state the lien of the plaintiff was prior or superior to the rights of Ficke as mortgagee. (Corning v. Ashley, 51 Hun, 483; affd. on opinion below,
Ficke knew on July 30, 1914, when, with his consent, Dunn took the property to his stable, all the facts in regard to the boarding and keeping of the property by, and the lien of, the plaintiff. It, therefore, is not necessary that we should, and we do not, consider or determine whether or not a person becoming, without notice of those facts and for value, a purchaser, mortgagee or bailee of the property through Dunn, while in his qualified possession, would acquire rights paramount to the lien.
The findings of the trial justice, although inconsistent, establish that Ficke had, as the keeper of a livery stable, a lien upon the property for the sum due him for boarding and keeping it from July 30 to November 29, 1914.
The judgments of the Appellate Division and of the Special Term should have decreed and should be so modified as to decree that the plaintiff recover and be paid first out of the moneys now in the hands of the *522 sheriff of the county of New York, in this action, ten hundred and fifty-six dollars and eighty-two cents; that Ficke recover and be paid next therefrom the sum of ten hundred and thirty-eight dollars and ninety-eight cents, each payment to be with interest from the date of the judgment of the Special Term, and further, so much of the sum of nine hundred and forty-three dollars and thirty-five cents as the balance, if any, would pay, and the judgment of the Appellate Division should be further modified by striking therefrom the allowance to the defendant Ficke of the sum of one hundred and sixteen dollars and forty cents, his disbursements as allowed and taxed, with costs in this court and in the Appellate Division to the plaintiff as against the defendant Ficke.
HISCOCK, Ch. J., CHASE, CUDDEBACK, HOGAN and McLAUGHLIN, JJ., concur; CRANE, J., absent.
Judgment accordingly.