HUGE LOSSES

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 88, 4 December 1931, Page 6

HUGE LOSSES

(Press Assn.—

LAND DEALS bankrupt farmer' s disgharge opposed AFFAIRS YERY INVOLVED

-By Telegraph-

— Copyrlght.)

HAMILTON, Thursday. Opposition to an application for discharge from bankruptcy by Max Jonas Friedlander, farmer, Hamilton, was expressed in the Supreme Court at Hamilton, before Mr. Justice Herdman this morning. Counsel representing several local creditors contended that bankrupt had incurred the debts to trading concerns with no i*easonable expectation of being able to pay them. His affairs had become very involved. Bankrupt's counsel pointed out that the official assignee vjas perfectly satisfied with Friedlander's position. which was due solely to the fall in the price of butter-fat. His liabilities totalled £33,000 and the debts consisted mostly of advances by his father-in-law and aunt. Only £1100 was claimed by ordinary trading cre- - ditors. Bankrupt had been milking •■300 cows on a property of e>00 acres at Tuhikaramea. The effect of ld • drop per 1b in butter-fat was a loss of £250 to bankrupt. Lost £16,000 in Cash. In the witness-box, bankrupt said he filed his petition last February. Debts pwing to unsecured creditors ■ totalled £1100. His losses were due to the sudden fall in butter-fat, and £300 had been lost on pigs. As a result of the bankruptcy he had lost * £16,000 of his own in cash. To creditors' counsel, bankrupt said most of the unsecured debts ( were incurred between 1929 and » 1930. There were two first mortgages, a third moftgage and second ; mortgage of £16,000, which had been reduced to £9400 over the whole arsa. The total mortgage indebtedness on the property amounted to £36,000. He . bopght the property in March, 1927, , and considered it was worth about . £36 per acre.

To his counsel, bankrupt said he was solvent at the end of 1929. He took part in the management of his farm. When he incurred accounts he anticipated no difficulty in. meeting them as butter-fat had then not dropped. At the second meeting of credit- . ors ealled only one had attended, and that man was not objeeting to the discharge to-day. Position in July, 1930. Creditors' counsel cross-examined bankrupt closely on a car he bought seven months before filing. He denied that he knew he was insolvent in July, 1930. His Honour said bankrupt's position should be known at the time the debts were incurred. . The official assignee stated bank- - rupt had produced books which had - satisfied him. He had found nothing - against bankrupt. His Honour said it should be known whether bankrupt was insolvent when he incurred the debts. He • advised the official assignee to make a supplementary report. The assignee agreed, and the casc was adjourned until Wednesday.