Recent Important Decisions

Bailments – Carriers – Conversion – Trover by Bailee (A Common Carrier) Against a Third Person – On the facts as stated by the court of last resort it is often difficult to discover why any action should ever have been thought of, and impossible to see how the judgment of the trial court should have been in favor of the preposterous claim of the plaintiff. Such seems to be the case of Farmers’ Cotton Oil Co. v. Atlanta & St. A. B. Ry. Co. (Ala. I918), 79 So. 387. Plaintiff carrier by mistake delivered cotton seed to defendant company. Defendant by mistake, not even negligent mistake it would appear, received and used the cotton seed and paid the freight. The consignor and his vendee called off the sale, and defendant paid to the consignee the full or agreed price for the seed. The carrier then demanded the seed of defendant, and without offering to return the freight money now brings trover !