Baehr v. Wolf

Citations

• 59 Ill. 470

Syllabus

<p>1. Trustee—whether liable for neglect. Where the owner of personal property placed the same in the hands of a third person, under an agreement that the latter should sell the property, and with the proceeds pay the debts of the former, and while the property was so held it was seized under an attachment against the owner, and subsequently sold under a judgment in that proceeding, it was held, the person who was thus prevented by legal process, over which he had no control, from performing his agreement, could not be charged with the value of the property, or the loss occasioned by the forced sale.</p> <p>2. Contracts against public policy—whether equity mil interpose as between the parties. Should a party, indicted for an alleged crime, convey his property to another as security for becoming his bail, and for the purpose of assisting the former to flee from justice, and the parties equally participate in the unlawful transaction, a court of equity would not interfere to restore the property to the grantor, as against a wrongful claim of the grantee that he was the absolute owner. Such a transaction tending to impede or prevent the course of justice, is against public policy, and neither of the parties to it, if in pari delicto, could invoke the aid of a court of equity in respect to it.</p> <p>3. But if the parties to such a transaction do not stand in pari delicto,— as, if the grantee obtained the conveyance under circumstances of oppression, imposition, hardship, undue influence, or great inequality of condition or age, so that the guilt of the grantor was far less in degree than that of his associate in the offense, the grantee, a court of equity may, in a proper case, interpose to compel the grantee to relinquish his unjust claim to the property.</p> <p>4. So in this case, a party having been indicted, and discharged upon bail, the surety on his recognizance, who was his brother-in-law, and the wife of the latter, who was a sister of the accused, advised him