Maxler v. Hawk

Citations

• 233 Pa. 316
• 82 A. 251
• 1912 Pa. LEXIS 823

Syllabus

<p>Detimie — Possession—Evidence.</p> <p>1. Prior possession is sufficient to sustain detinue by the prior possessor against anyone who cannot show a superior right of possession.</p> <p>Gifts — Gift inter vivos — Evidence—Burden of proof — Detimie.</p> <p>2. Where the defendant in an action of detinue sets up a gift inter vivos as a defense, the burden of proof is upon him to establish all the facts essential to the validity of such gift.</p> <p>3. The essential elements of a gift inter vivos are an intention to give, and such actual or constructive delivery of the thing given as places the absolute control or dominion over the gift in the donee.</p> <p>4. When an alleged donor has been surrounded during his last sickness by the family and relatives of the alleged donee, and the claimant has had opportunities to obtain possession of the subject of the alleged gift without title, the proof in support of the claim ought to be clear and satisfactory upon every point essential to title by gift.</p> <p>5. The mere fact that a person claiming property as a gift has it in his possession after the death of the alleged donor has little, if any, weight on the question of the gift, where the claimant has had access to the property and effects of the alleged donor during his last sickness, or after his death. Thus where a father claims negotiable bonds as a gift inter vivos from his deceased son, the fact that the father had possession of the bonds immediately after the son’s death is to be given little weight where the evidence would justify a finding that the son kept the bonds with his other valuable papers in his father’s house where he resided, and that the father had access to such papers.</p> <p>6. In an action of detinue by an executor against the decedent’s father to recover possession of negotiable bonds found in possession of the father after the son’s death and claimed by the father as a gift inter vivos from the son, the mere proof that the son had retained the bo