Bovard v. American Horse Enterprises, Inc

Bovard v. American Horse Enterprises, Inc.

1988 California Court of Appeals

• Plaintiff was to sell ‘American Horse Enterprises’ to James Ralph, which manufactures marijuana paraphenelia.
• Ralph wrote promisory note to Bovard, Bovard conveyed business to Ralph.
• Ralph wants to invalidate promisory note on basis that business manufactures illegal products
• Gambling contracts often invalidated because they are illegal
• Plaintiff claims contract doesn’t violate public policy, because manufacturing drug paraphenelia itself was not illegal when contract was made, precedent Moran v. Harris [182 Cal.Rptr. 519] where particular rule in agreement was not prohibited until after contract was made.
• No unjust enrichment by leaving parties where they stand–by self help, Bovard took back a lot of what he sold.

• In Pari Delicto: when both parties are at fault, defendant is in better position.
• Example: broker tells clients they should purchase company’s stock because company has discovered gold but market doesn’t know yet. Turns out to be false, clients sue broker. Defense: In Pari Delicto–clients shouldn’t have been trading on insider information to begin with.
• Court didn’t find players at equal fault in this case: broker is repeat player who you more likely want to penalize.

• Clean Hands: Traditional doctrine that ‘if you have unclean hands, you can’t come into a court of equity’. Intent of doctrine is to maintain legitimacy of court/government.

Conclusion

Notes

See Also

References and Further Reading

About the Author/s and Reviewer/s

Author: international


Posted

in

, , ,

by

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *