THE CITIZENS AND SOUTHERN NATIONAL BANK, A NATIONAL BANKING INSTITUTE CHARTERED UNDER THE LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, APPELLANT,
v.
M. C. TAYLOR AND JEAN TAYLOR, HIS WIFE, APPELLEES
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A bank appealed the dismissal of its equity complaint seeking to impress a lien on a house that the defendants allegedly moved to different property to defraud the bank of its security interest. The court reversed, holding that the complaint stated a valid cause of action in equity because conversion—though potentially available at law—would not provide a full, adequate, and complete remedy for the bank's loss of its prior secured interest.
The complaint states a valid cause of action cognizable in equity. Although conversion might be available at law, it does not provide a full, adequate, and complete remedy for the bank's situation because a conversion judgment does not address the bank's prior debt secured by mortgage on the house and original land.
“The mere existence of a legal remedy does not prevent a suit in equity unless the legal remedy be plain, certain, prompt, speedy, sufficient, full and complete, practical and efficient in attaining the ends of justice.”
Establishes the standard for when equity jurisdiction is proper despite availability of a legal remedy
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceLee Homes, Inc. built a house for the Taylors on their property in Okaloosa County, Florida. The builder received a note and mortgage that was assigne…
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The plaintiff, The Citizens and Southern National Bank, has appealed from an interlocutory order in a chancery action granting the Taylors’ motion to dismiss its complaint.
We are confronted with the sole question of whether the complaint states a cause of action in equity. We find that it does and reverse.
The Citizens and Southern National Bank filed its complaint alleging that pursuant to a contract Lee Homes, Inc. built a house for defendants, the Taylors, on property owned by them in Okaloosa County, Florida. In payment therefor the builder received a note and mortgage which was later assigned to Pioneer Finance Company. Foreclosure proceedings were had and certificate of title was issued to the Bank’s predecessor in title. Attached to the complaint were copies of the Construction Agreement, the Completion Certificate, the Mortgage Note and the Mortgage. The Construction Agreement described the property upon which the house was to be built in Okaloosa County, thusly:
“down hwy. 90, turn right on hwy. 90, . turn left past Bar 85, first house on right, inquire at Mr. Taylor’s green house.”
The mortgage stated that the property was in Okaloosa County, Florida, and described same by a metes and bounds description in Section 20, Township 3 N., Range 23 W.
The complaint further alleged that the defendants physically moved the house from the property upon which it was built to other described property in Okaloosa *867County in Section 6, Township 3 N., Range 23 W., with the intent to defraud the Plaintiff Bank of its equitable interest in the house. It alleged that the house is now being claimed by the defendants as their homestead and that Plaintiff will be deprived of its security unless the Court of Equity takes jurisdiction and grants it the right to move the house from the property on which it is now situated, or in the alternative, grants Plaintiff a judgment against the homestead.
Thus, the Plaintiff Bank sought to impress an equitable lien upon the house by either securing a judgment against the house or authority to remove same.
The appellees contend that the chancellor dismissed the complaint because the Bank had available a remedy at law in the form of conversion for the removed house. Appellant contends that even if conversion would lie in this case, a judgment in such an action does not meet the test of a full, adequate and complete remedy, when it had prior to the wrongdoing a debt secured by a mortgage on the house and the land on which it was built. We agree with the appellant without deciding whether conversion was available under the factual situation poised here.
The mere existence of a legal remedy does not prevent a suit in equity unless the legal remedy be plain, certain, prompt, speedy, sufficient, full and complete, practical and efficient in attaining the ends of justice.1
We find that the allegations of the complaint taken as a whole when read with the attached exhibits sufficiently state a cause of action cognizable in equity.2
Reversed and remanded with directions to reinstate the complaint.
JOHNSON and SACK, JJ., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
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McNORTON v. PAN Am. Bank OF Orlando, N.A., 387 So. 2d 393 (Fla. 5th DCA 1980)…re existence of a legal remedy does not prevent a suit in equity unless the legal remedy be plain, certain, prompt, speedy, sufficient, full and complete, practical and efficient in attaining the ends of justice. Citizens & So. Nat. Bank v. Taylor, 191 So. 2d 866, 867 (Fla. 1st DCA 1966). The Florida Supreme Court in Ponce v. Demos, 159 Fla. 117, 31 So. 2d 58 (1947) discussed the standard for determining adequacy of the remedy at law: [T]he test of whether law or equity affords the most adequate remedy may…
Authorities Cited
- Morgan F. Jones in Bankr. of Jacksonville Bread Co. v. Carpenter, 106 So. 127 (Fla. 1925)