Hall v. Susskind

Citations

• 120 Cal. 559
• 53 P. 46
• 1898 Cal. LEXIS 809

Syllabus

<p>Action by Assignee op Insolvent—Fraud—Circumstantial Evidence.— In an action by an assignee in insolvency to recover the value oí property of the insolvent debtor, alleged to have been fraudulently secreted and concealed by the insolvent and her husband, who was manager of her business, to prevent the property from coming into the possession of the assignee, and to have been converted and sold by the defendant with knowledge of such concealment, the fraudulent secretion, and the conversion of the property with knowledge of its concealment, may be proved by circumstantial evidence. The.evidence reviewed, and held sufficient to warrant a recovery by the assignee.</p> <p>Id.—Estimate op Evidence—Failure to Explain Possession.—Under section 2061 of the Code of Civil Procedure, evidence is to be estimated not only- by its intrinsic weight, but also according to the evidence which it is in the power of one side to produce, and the other to contradict; and where the evidence points to the fraudulent concealment of a very large part in value of the insolvent’s stock in trade prior to the filing of the petition, and shows that the similar stock in trade of the defendant and sales thereof were largely augmented from some undisclosed source, and included goods identified aa having been purchased by the insolvent, it being an easy matter for the defendant to prove whether they were legitimately obtained and how they were so obtained, and difficult for the plaintiff to prove the contrary, the failure of the defendant to offer any proof upon the subject, justified unfavorable inferences against him, that the sale made by him included goods surreptitiously Withheld from the assignee.</p> <p>In.’—Description of Property—Certainty.—No such degree of certainty in the 'description of the property converted as will identify the particular goods concealed and converted is required, when from the dispersion of the goods in the usual course of retail traffic, and other difficulties app