Banque Belge pour L'Etranger v Hambrouck
| Banque Belge pour L’Etranger v Hambrouck | |
|---|---|
| Court | Court of Appeal |
| Keywords | |
| Receipt, tracing | |
Banque Belge pour L’Etranger v Hambrouck [1921] 1 KB 321 is an English trusts law case concerning the common law remedies for receipt of trust property.
Facts
Mr Hambrouck forged cheques so £6000 came out of the Belge Banque account of Mr Pelabon, his employer, and was put into his own Farrow’s Bank account. Then Mr Hambrouck took out money and paid his mistress Mlle Spanoghe, who gave no consideration. She paid the money to her account at the London Joint City and Midland bBank, where she had £315 credit. Banque Belge sued Mr Hambrouck, Mlle Spanoghe and the London Bank for the money. The London Bank paid the money into court.
Salter J held the money should be repaid.
Judgment
The Court of Appeal held that the money should be repaid. Atkin LJ noted the argument of Hambrouck that title could not be asserted because after passing through other bank accounts, it could no longer be identified. But In re Hallett’s Estate said that was not a problem because any transfer to an innocent donee would defeat an original owner’s claim. He said the following.
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At present it appears to me that the plaintiff Bank intended to pass the property in and the possession of the cash which under the operations of the clearing house they must be taken to have paid to the collecting bank. I will assume therefore that this is a case not of a void but of a voidable transaction by which Hambrouck obtained a title to the money until the plaintiffs elected to avoid his title, which they did when they made their claim in this action. The title would then revest in the plaintiffs subject to any title acquired in the meantime by any transferee for value without notice of the fraud. ...I venture to doubt whether the common law ever so restricted the right as to hold that the money became incapable of being traced, merely because paid into the broker’s general account with his banker. The question always was, Had the means of ascertainment failed? But if in 1815 the common law halted outside the bankers’ door, by 1879 equity had had the courage to lift the latch, walk in and examine the books: In re Hallett’s Estate. I see no reason why the means of ascertainment so provided should not now be available both for common law and equity proceedings.
Bankes LJ and Scrutton LJ gave concurring judgments.
