Innocent purchaser

“ In some countries, under the civil law, a buyer of immovables is of right entitled to a rescission of the sale if it turn out, though without fraud, that the price was more than fifty per cent. above the true value. ”

“ Who are the complainants? Are they not the very bondholders, self-incorporated into a body politic, who, through their trustee and agent, effected the sale which was declared fraudulent and void, as against creditors, and made the purchase which has been set aside for that cause? Was it ever known that a fraudulent purchaser of property, when deprived of its possession, could recover for his repairs or improvements, or for incumbrances lifted by him whilst in possession? ”

“ Where an article is on sale in the market, and there is no fraud on the part of the seller, and the buyer gets what he intended to buy, he is liable for the purchase price, though the article turns out to be worthless. ”

“ In all of those cases in which it has been ruled that the buyer who, at the time of the sale, knows nothing of the relation between the factor with whom he deals and the principal by whom that factor has been employed, is protected by the law, in case of a misadventure occurring by the default of the factor, it is admitted that the risk which a principal runs, through the inadvertence or misconduct of his agent, may be avoided, by the purchaser having notice, at any time before the completion of the purchase or delivery of the goods, of the agent's commission. ”

“ But if the goods themselves be lost or stolen, no sale of them by the finder or thief, though to a bona fide purchaser for value, will divest the ownership of the person who lost them, or from whom they were stolen. ”

“ If the situation actually was that the buyer either had a positive intention not to pay, or was so hopelessly insolvent that any reasonable person would know he could not pay for the goods, the transaction is fraudulent; the seller still retains an equity, and may reclaim the goods from the buyer who has acquired a legal title or from any other person except a bona fide purchaser. ”

“ This is the consequence, where his purpose is to aid the seller in perpetrating a fraud upon his creditors, and where he buys recklessly, with guilty knowledge. When the fact of fraud is established in a suit at law, the buyer loses the property without reference to the amount or application of what he has paid, and he can have no relief either at law or in equity. ”

“ The burden is upon the attacking creditor, but where the fraudulent intent on the grantor's part is made out, and the circumstances are suspicious, the purchaser must show that he has paid value; and, if he does, it must then appear that the purchaser had notice of the fraud. ”

“ Whatever hardship, if any, may follow to private persons who sell or buy it, and attempt to divert it to their own use, falls upon them, as in other cases, where titles fail, even in the hands of innocent, because ignorant, purchasers. ”

“ To be so, he must be, in your opinion, not only a purchaser without any manner of notice or knowledge of any fraud in the assignment, such as the law requires to be given to him; he must also be a purchaser for a valuable consideration, actually paid, and the property must have been bona fide conveyed to him, pursuant to the purchase, so that the purchase must be in all respects an absolute one, such as it purports to be. If you are not satisfied that this is the character of his purchase, and his as a purchaser, then he is in no better situation than the assignees ”

“ Where goods are purchased in several parcels, to be paid for at a future day, the whole, within the meaning of the Statute of Frauds, constitutes but one contract, and the delivery of part to the purchaser is sufficient to take the case out of the operation of the Statute of Frauds. ”

“ If the contract has been executed by the delivery of possession and the payment of the price, the grounds of interference are limited by the covenants of the deed, or to cases of fraud and misrepresentation. 'The cases will show,' say this court, 'that a purchaser in the undisturbed possession of the land will not be relieved against the payment of the purchase money on the mere ground of defect of title, there being no fraud or misrepresentation ”

“ That to perfect the form of sale, and to make it conform to the ostensible title of the purchaser, the complainants rented the property of the defendant. That having obtained an apparent title, the defendant has fraudulently determined to act as if he was the real owner, and is claiming the right to sell, and that through threats he extorted an agreement from the complainants, which was framed and meant to involve them in the recognition of his title. ”

“ This is a suit for the rescission of a contract of purchase, and to recover the moneys paid thereon, on the ground that it was induced by the false and fraudulent representations of the vendors. In respect to such an action it has been laid down by many authorities that, where the means of knowledge respecting the matters falsely represented are equally open to purchaser and vendor, the former is charged with knowledge of all that by the use of such means he could have ascertained. ”

“ If one goes into a store to buy a bushel of apples that he has seen by the door and inquires the price and pays for them without making any inquiry concerning their quality, he cannot recover his money if half of them prove to be rotten unless the seller intentionally deceived him, for he might have inquired whether they were all like those on top and of good quality. But if the merchant should put fine ones on top in order to deceive a purchaser, he could recover for his loss. ”

“ If, in the sale of property, a smaller price is paid than was agreed upon, and the purchaser should, fraudulently, and against the will of the vendor, declare that he has paid a higher price than he should have done, he shall be compelled to pay to the vendor double the amount of which the latter has been defrauded. ”

“ No decision lays down a positive rule that such sales, though affected by such bidding, are, per se, and as between all persons, void. They may be avoided by parties whose just interests have been injuriously affected by such misconduct, provided the rights of innocent third persons are not thereby disturbed. ”

“ No principle of the common law has been better established, or more often affirmed, both in this country and in England, than that in sales of personal property, in the absence of express warranty, where the buyer has an opportunnity to inspect the commodity, and the seller is guilty of no fraud, and is neither the manufacturer nor grower of the article he sells, the maxim of caveat emptor applies. ”

“ Williams was the case of a purchaser at an auction sale, seeking to be relieved from his purchase because of fraud practiced at the sale by the auctioneer, who was the general agent of the owners, and the benefits of which sale the owners received. After a reference to many authorities, the court placed the liability of the owners upon these grounds: 'What the vendor may not do in person, or may not employ others to do in his absence, that is, make by-bids to enhance the price,-his agent, the auctioneer, cannot rightfully do. ”

“ But, independently of the fact of such full payment, we are of opinion that a purchaser of a negotiable security before maturity, in cases where he is not personally chargeable with fraud, is entitled to recover its full amount against its maker, though he may have paid less than its par value, whatever may have been its original infirmity. ”

“ If, therefore, a man bargain for the purchase of goods, and desire the vendor to keep them in possession, for a special purpose, for the vendee, and the vendor accept the order, it is a sufficient delivery, within the statute of frauds. ”

“ This same conduct of the feme, her positive co operation in the arrangements for the sale of the property, and her acquiescence in that sale until after the title had been made to the purchaser, furnish such presumption of the absence of fraud in the transactions complained of, which, if it is not absolutely conclusive, certainly calls for contravening evidence of a direct and powerful character,-evidence of force sufficient to overthrow and set aside the complainant's own acts and declarations. ”

“ When the means of knowledge are open and at hand, or furnished to the purchaser or his agent, and no effort is made to prevent the party from using them, and especially where the purchaser undertakes examination for himself, he will not be heard to say that he has been deceived to his injury to the misrepresentations of the vendor. ”

“ If the purchaser of such thread desires a particular make, he should either call for such, in which case the dealer, if he put off on him a different make, would be guilty of fraud, for which the defendants would not be responsible, or should examine himself the lettering upon the spools. ”

“ While it has been sometimes held that proof of selling to one person was, at least, prima facie evidence of criminality, the real offense consists in carrying on such business; and if only a single sale were proven it might be a good defense to show that such sale was exceptional, accidental, or made under such circumstances as to indicate that it was not the business of the vendor. ”

“ It would seem to be difficult, on principle, to maintain that the possession of goods sold is, per se, fraud, to be so pronounced by the court, as that cuts off all explanation of the transaction, which may have been entirely unexceptionable. ”

“ In event of a failure on the part of the purchaser, vendor and the witnesses before whom he alleges he consummated the transaction to appear in the case, and the owner does produce witnesses to establish his ownership in said property, the purchaser, in failing to produce his witnesses to the transaction and the vendor as aforesaid, shall be adjudged to be a thief and shall suffer the death penalty. ”

“ It is urged as a criticism that the statute directs the junk dealer's inquiry to the question of the legal right of the seller to sell, rather than to the question of an original larceny. It ought to be unnecessary to say that if goods have in fact been stolen, a diligent inquiry into the right of the present possessor to make sale or delivery of them will very surely tend to disclose the larcenous origin of his title. ”

“ There is a proverb full of wisdom—as these brief embodiments of experience often are—to the effect that in commerce 'the buyer's eye is his merchant.' It has found its way into our legal text-books, to express a principle which modern law has had much in view—that people should look to their own skill and knowledge in making their purchases, and should not trust to the legislature to protect them, by interference and penalties, from purchasing unworthy commodities. Undoubtedly, fraud, when it occurs, must be punished. ”

“ It would seem to be a self-evident proposition that when it is conceded that a sale was in fact fair, honest, and just when made, that no unlawful act or intent then existed, that a fraudulent intent or an unjust dealing as to that time could not be imputed to the party from subsequent occurrences. ”

“ They are held to be constructively fraudulent as to creditors, and the property, so far as their rights are concerned, is considered as belonging to the purchaser holding the possession. McCormick v. Hadden, 37 Ill. ”

“ The supreme court of the United States has affirmed the doctrine that an absolute and unconditional bill of sale or conveyance, when the property is retained in possession, is of itself conclusive evidence of fraud ”

“ It may be that the true owner by his negligence or carelessness may have put it in the power of a finder or thief to occupy ostensibly the position of a true owner, and his carelessness may estop him from asserting his right against a purchaser who has been misled to his hurt by that carelessness. ”

“ After conviction of the thief the goods must be recovered from the person in whose hands they are at the time of the conviction, for any sales and resales, if the first sale was in market overt, are good until conviction of the thief. If the goods were obtained by false pretences and not by larceny, the question then is whether the property in the goods has passed or not, and the answer to this question depends upon the nature of the false pretences employed. ”

“ The vendor, however, will be bound to transfer to the purchaser all his rights of action for the recovery of the object or damages, for, not having yet delivered it to the purchaser, he still remains its owner, and the same holds good of the penal actions on theft and on unlawful damage. ”

“ Where no fraud is intended, but the honest purpose of the parties is that the vendee shall not have the ownership of the goods until he has paid for them, there is no general principle of law to prevent their purpose from having effect.
In this country, in states where no such statute as the English act referred to is in force, many decisions have been rendered sustaining conditional sales accompanied by delivery of possession, both as between the parties themselves and as to third persons. ”

“ There can be no question of the soundness of the plaintiffs' proposition that, irrespective of the technical question of trade-mark, the defendants have no right to dress their goods up in such manner as to deceive an intending purchaser, and induce him to believe he is buying those of the plaintiffs. ”

“ That, 'as respects creditors, the law requires of one, who has been drawn by fraud into the purchase of stock, that he shall be guilty of no negligence or want of reasonable care in discovering the fraud, and, on discovering it, promptly repudiating the purchase. ”