Anglo-Californian Bank, Ltd. v. Superior Court of the State in and for S.F.

[754]

ANGELLOTTI, J.

Upon the petition of plaintiff filed in this court, a writ of review was issued commanding defendants to certify to this court, in order that the same might he reviewed, a transcript of the record and proceedings culminating in an order of said superior court requiring plaintiff to pay to Edward J. Le Breton, as receiver of the California Safe Deposit & Trust Company, an insolvent corporation, $47,637.55 held by it as the agent of said insolvent at the time of the adjudication of insolvency. The claim of plaintiff was that such order was in excess of the jurisdiction of the court and, therefore, void. Defendants duly certified to this court a transcript of such record and proceedings, and the matter has been submitted for decision.

It appears from the record that- in a proceeding instituted in said superior court under the Bank Commission Act, by the people of the state of California by the attorney-general against said California Safe Deposit & Trust Company and its directors, judgment was given on January 14, 1908, decreeing said corporation insolvent, ordering it into involuntary liquidation and appointing Edward J. Le Breton as receiver thereof to take possession of all its property and to do all things necessary in the liquidation of its affairs. Plaintiff, a banking corporation, was at such time an agent of the insolvent corporation for certain purposes, and as such agent had in its possession $94,469.23, carried on its books to the credit of said insolvent. The receiver having demanded an accounting of plaintiff as to the money in its possession belonging or credited to the insolvent, plaintiff on January 22, 1908, rendered an account showing the above facts. On January 24, 1908, plaintiff notified the receiver that it had received written notice from the partnership firm of Stewart & McKee that said firm claimed that $3,349.77 of said sum was its own property and was not the property of the insolvent, and that plaintiff must not pay the same or any part thereof to the receiver. On the same day, it also notified the receiver of the receipt of a similar notice from the Western Pacific Railway Company as to $44,287.78. Solely because of said claims by said third parties, and not claiming any beneficial interest on its own part, plaintiff refused to pay to the receiver any part of either of the said amounts, and paid only the. balance of said $94,469.23—viz. $46,831.68. These facts having been