Charles Nelson Co. v. Pacific Wharf & Storage Co.

Defendants appeal from a judgment in favor of the plaintiff in an action to recover damages for the destruction of certain lumber, the property of plaintiff, which had been stored on the wharf of the defendant Pacific Wharf & Storage Company, a corporation, and was destroyed by fire, caused, it is alleged, by the negligence of the Pacific Wharf & Stórage Company, hereafter referred to simply as the “defendant” or as the “appellant.” With the exception of the defendant E. A. Mills, the defendants and appellants other than the Pacific Wharf & Storage Company are the holders of stock in that corporation, and as such are sued upon their stockholder’s statutory liability. Mills is not a stockholder, judgment was rendered in his favor, and he is not a party aggrieved. As it is admitted that the defendant stockholders are properly chargeable with their respective proportions of plaintiff’s claim for damages if the defendant corporation is liable, we shall treat the case as though the Pacific Wharf & Storage Company were the sole defendant and appellant.

Defendant, a wharfinger, owns a wharf at East San Pedro—Port Los Angeles. On August 11, 1916, certain lumber, the property of…