Stoner v. Walsh

Opinion

FLEMING, J.

This appeal is from an order staying enforcement and execution by Claire P. Stoner of a judgment secured by her against Joe Walsh. The judgment was the outgrowth of a domestic melodrama played in 1967 when Joe and Claire, friends and coworkers at North American Aviation since 1959, each filed suit for divorce from their respective spouses Lois and Robert with further matrimony in mind. Joe negotiated a property settlement with his wife Lois and agreed to pay her $10,690 for her interest in their house and furniture on Wynkoop Avenue and a waiver of support. But a hitch developed. Lois wanted payment in cash, and Joe had no cash. “The divorce is off,” Joe told Claire. But Claire had money in her savings account, and she was willing to lend $10,690 to Joe. Joe promised to give her a note secured by a deed of trust on the Wynkoop house, for which he shortly thereafter substituted a promise of a deed of trust on apartments on Manchester Avenue he planned to acquire in trade for the Wynkoop house. On 23 August 1967 Claire withdrew $10,690 from her savings account and gave it to Joe, who paid it to his wife Lois, who in turn quitclaimed the Wynkoop house to Joe and thereafter invested her property settlement money in other Los Angeles property. Meanwhile Claire moved into the Wynkoop house with Joe.

Within a few days Joe initiated escrow arrangements to trade the Wynkoop house for the Manchester apartments, and on 25 September 1967 he prepared a non-interest-bearing promissory note for $10,690 payable to Claire on 1 January 1969 and secured by a deed of trust on the Manchester apartments and delivered these documents to the attorney who represented both Joe and Claire in their respective divorce actions. Joe

[941]

told Claire not to record the deed of trust for six months because recordation would interfere with his financing arrangements. According to Claire: “He just said, ‘Don’t tell anyone about the loan and understand you can’t record the trust deed because if you record it, the loan company will find out about me owing you this money and I won’t be able to get the loan, so keep it quiet for six months and then you can record it.’ ’’

In November 1967 the escrow closed, Joe obtained his divorce from Lois, and Joe and Claire moved into the Manchester apartments. But happiness evidently eluded them, for on 15 December Joe reconciled with his divorced wife Lois. On 16 December, by means of coercive tactics against Claire, Joe obtained Claire’s written authorization to pick up from the attorney’s office Claire’s unrecorded note and deed of trust on the Manchester apartments, which Joe then destroyed. Thereafter Claire returned to her husband Robert, and Joe remarried Lois. Thus at the end of 1967 Lois had the Los Angeles property she had purchased with her settlement money, Joe had the Manchester apartments, and Claire had Joe’s broken promises.