141 Mo. App. 386 | Mo. Ct. App. | 1910
As to the action of the court in overruling appellant’s motion to strike out a portion of respondent’s answer, it is sufficient to say that the defendants allege in their answer that the contract pleaded therein was executed at the same time the notes sued upon were, and as cotemporaneous with them, and if this were true, the contract and the notes in the hands
As to the second assignment of error that the court erred in admitting oral testimony as to conversations between the salesman of the jewelry company and the respondents prior to the execution of the note, this was admitted for the purpose of showing that the execution of the contract and the note was procured by false and fraudulent representations of the agent of the Equitable Manufacturing Company with whom the defendants were dealing. As fraud was pleaded in the answer this was the only way to prove it, and this testimony was clearly admissible.
Under the third assignment of error it is contended that the court should have submitted the case to the jury upon proper instructions and permitted the jury to pass upon the facts as to whether or not, in the first instance, the execution of the contract and note was procured by fraud and whether the plaintiff was a holder of the note in good faith and for value. Iu this contention we think the appellant is right. While the court may have been strongly impressed by the testimony in this case with the view that this entire transaction was a fraudulent scheme perpetrated jointly by the Equitable Manufacturing Company and the plaintiff by which the Equitable Manufacturing Company would send out its agents, and by deception impose upon innocent and unskilled merchants by trickery and knavery, and secure their signature to negotiable notes, then transfer them.to this plaintiff, and plaintiff then bring suit on the notes, pose as an inno