266 Pa. 394 | Pa. | 1920
Opinion by
This is an action against defendants, consisting of two individuals and the Land Title & Trust Company, a corporation, to recover loss sustained by plaintiffs in an exchange of properties they were induced to enter into by reason of alleged misrepresentations on the part of Albert W. Wilson, one of the defendants, as to the value of the properties for which plaintiffs’ property was exchanged, and by virtue of which misrepresentations, Wilson, acting as plaintiffs’ agent, made a large personal profit. The further claim is made that Walter Preston, another defendant, assisted Wilson to finance the deal by furnishing him with money belonging, in fact, to plaintiffs and that the Land Title & Trust Company also participated in the fraud by permitting settlements to be made through its officers without informing plaintiffs they were being defrauded. Wilson and Preston defended on the merits, while the Land Title & Trust Company, by its affidavit of defense, denied that plaintiffs’ statement of claim set out a cause of action against
The statement of claim sets forth that plaintiffs owned property at Morton, Delaware County, valued at $10,000 and employed Wilson to act as their agent in the exchange of the Morton property for twenty small houses in Germantown, Philadelphia. Wilson represented he could purchase these houses for the sum of $10,000, subject to certain mortgages, and pay for them by an exchange of plaintiffs’ Delaware County property. An exchange on the terms indicated being satisfactory to plaintiffs, two agreements of sale were executed, one between plaintiffs and Wilson, as “agent,” to convey to him the Morton property for $10,000, clear of encumbrances, and the other between the same parties wherein Wilson, as “agent,” agreed to convey to plaintiffs the Germantown houses for $10,000, subject to mortgages aggregating $38,000. It afterwards appeared that Wilson, though acting as plaintiffs’ agent, in fact purchased the houses for $5,000, subject to the mortgages referred to, and resold them to plaintiff for $10,000, making a personal profit of $5,000 on the transaction.
The statement also avers Preston participated in the fraud by furnishing Wilson $500 of plaintiffs’ money to enable the latter to make the first payment on account of the Germantown houses. Plaintiffs subsequently, in an action against Wilson, recovered judgment against him, but, owing to Wilson’s insolvency, was unable to collect the amount of the verdict rendered in their favor. As between plaintiffs and Wilson it is accordingly established that the latter was guilty of fraud and concealment and that he made a personal profit out of the transaction. The only question here involved is whether or not the trust company is liable as a party to the fraud.
The judgment of the court below is affirmed.