CASE IN CHANCERY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24405, 17 September 1940, Page 8

CASE IN CHANCERY

BANK OF NEW ZEALAND INVOLVED

iFhom Our Own Correspondent! LONDON, Aug, 15

In the Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice a claim by a Czechoslovak firm, in which the Bank of New Zealand was involved, was heard recently by Mr Justice Simonds. His Lordship had before him an inter-pleader issue, on a summons, in which the question was whether the plaintiffs in the issue (who were in England), or the defendant in the issue, were entitled to give a good receipi and discharge for a sum of £1376 13s 4d, held by the Bank of New Zealand, of Queen Victoria street, London on account of the firm of Bruder Bohm hat manufacturers in Czechoslovakia of which the plaintiffs were partners. The defendant was Mr Anton Czerny of Neutitichein, Sudetengau, Germany, who had been appointed by the competent authorities commissar manager of the firm of Bruder Bohm under a decree -dated January 11), 1939, made under a decree of Hitler, dated October 1, 1938, relating to the government of the Sudenlenland. The issue had been directed on a summons taken out by the Bank of Now Zealand in an action in which the plaintiffs claimed against the bank and Mr Czerny a declaration that the £1376 13s 4d was (heir (the plaintiff’s* property, and an injunction restraining the bank from paying the money or any part of it to Mr Czerny, or any other person without their consent. The money represented the price of goods bought from the firm by customers in New Zealand and paid to the bank’s London branch Mr Justice Simonds. in giving judg*ment said the decree of January 19 1939, was a confiscatory decree. He knew of no English case where confiscatory legislation, whether of a general character or of a character directed to a particular class of citizen, had been held to be' operative outside the Stale which enacted the confiscatory legislation.

His Lordship held that the firm of Bruder Bohm were entitled to give a good receipt and discharge for the money and to have it mad to them.