A car on hire purchase was sold and delivered by auctioneers on the instructions of the hirer. The court was asked whether the auctioneers’ liability was affected by the fact that the car had been sold under their provisional bid procedure.
Held: The auctioneers were liable. Lord Denning:’It is now, I think, well established that if an auctioneer sells goods by knocking down with his hammer at an auction and thereafter delivers them to the purchaser – then although he is only an agent – then if the vendor has no title to the goods, both the auctioneer and the purchaser are liable in conversion to the true owner, no matter how innocent the auctioneer may have been in handling the goods or the purchaser in acquiring them: see Barker v Furlong . . and Consolidated Co. v Curtis and Son . . This state of law has been considered by the Law Reform Committee . . in its 18th Report (Conversion and Detinue) (1971), Cmnd. 4774 as to innocent handlers: paragraphs 46-50. But Parliament has made no change in it: no doubt it would have done so in the Torts (Interference with Goods) Act 1977 if it had thought fit to do so.’
Lord Denning
[1978] 1 WLR 438
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Marcq v Christe Manson and Woods (t/a Christies) QBD 29-Oct-2002
The claimant sought damages for conversion from the respondent auctioneers as bailees. The painting had been registered as stolen. It failed to achieve its reserve and had been returned.
Held: It was for a bailee to prove that he had acted in . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Contract, Agency
Updated: 16 November 2021; Ref: scu.181802