Ellis v. Superior Court

JENNINGS, J. This is an original application for a writ of certiorari. The petition which was filed with this court on February 2Ó, 1934, alleges that prior to March 17, 1931, an action numbered 20966 was instituted in the Superior Court of Riverside County in which Walter Gould Lincoln was plaintiff and W. F. Dreher, Fairview Farms Company, a trust; Fairview Finance Corporation, a corporation; Dreher & Philpott, Inc., a corporation, and Farm Finance Company, Ltd., a corporation, were defendants; that the action was one at law instituted for the purpose of recovering a money judgment for services alleged to have been rendered by the plaintiff therein as an attorney at law for the defendants in said action; that such proceedings were taken in said action that on May 5, 1932, a judgment was rendered therein in the plaintiff’s favor and against the said defendants for the sum of $5,000, together with interest amounting to $1,050, and costs; that the defendants waived their right to appeal from the judgment in writing; that on May 20, 1932,. the plaintiff in said action applied for the appointment of a receiver of all the properties of the defendants and his petition therefor was filed in the respondent court; that oh June 7, 1932, the [554]respondent court made an order appointing receivers for all the defendants in the aforesaid action and particularly for the defendant Farm Finance Company, Ltd., that pursuant to said order the receivers so appointed seized and took possession of all properties of the defendants and especially the properties of the defendants W. F. Dreher and Fairview Farms Company, a trust; that the respondent court in making the aforesaid order for the appointment of receivers acted in excess of its jurisdiction and the order thus made was a void order; that Ethel Ellis, the petitioner herein, is a creditor of Fairview Farms Company, a trust, and of W. F. Dreher, and was a creditor of said defendants at the time the aforesaid action was filed by Walter Gould Lincoln, plaintiff therein; that on May 23, 1930, she filed a complaint in the Superior Court of Riverside County in an action entitled Ethel Ellis, Plaintiff, v. Fairview Farms Company, a Voluntary Trust, W. F. Dreher, M. A. Eandelin, John Doe, Richard Doe, and Jane Doe as Trustees, and W. F. Dreher, Defendants, numbered 20754, and thereafter on January 23, 1933, judgment was entered in her favor against the defendants Fairview Farms Company, a voluntary trust, and W. F. Dreher for the sum of $4,741.70, which judgment has not been paid or discharged and is now in full force and effect and the petitioner herein is now the beneficial owner of an undivided one-half interest in said judgment; that petitioner was not at any time a party to the action No. 20966 instituted by Walter Gould Lincoln and has no standing in the respondent court to raise the question of the lack of jurisdiction of said court to make the order appointing receivers in said action; that notwithstanding the invalidity of the order appointing receivers the respondent court, through the receivers thus appointed, has taken possession of all the assets and properties of Fairview Farms Company and W. F. Dreher and is continuing to hold possession thereof and to operate and sell the same and is thereby preventing the petitioner herein from interfering with said properties in disregard of the rights of petitioner; that petitioner has no plain, speedy or adequate remedy by appeal or otherwise and will suffer irreparable loss and damage and will be deprived of her right to enforce a levy of execution upon the property of her judgment debtors if the aforesaid