Brown v. Real Estate Investment Co.

Briscoe, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The plaintiff brought this suit against the defendant, in the Superior Court of Baltimore City upon the following promissory note: ⁴⁹⁴ “Laurel, ML, January 10, 1919. “Sixty days after date I promise to pay to the order of the Real Estate Investment Company eleven hundred 00/100 dollars at its office, Patuxent Bank Bldg., Laurel, Md. Value received. Assigned accounts for $1,500 as collateral security hereof. “(Signed) Harold N. Brown.” The declaration is an assumpsit, upon the common counts and! also sets out that the defendant, on the 10th day of January, 1919, by his promissory note now overdue, promised to pay to the plaintiff $1,100 sixty days after date, but did not pay the same. The defendant pleaded, never indebted as alleged, never promised as alleged, and for the third plea, that the plaintiff is a corporation, incorporated under the laws of the State of Maryland, and that the promissory note sued ou in the case was executed and delivered undeb the following circumstances.: Oao.

January 10th, 1919, the defendant borrowed from the plaintiff the sum of one thousand and thirty-four dollars ($1,034.00) for which he gave to the plaintiff his promissory note for eleven hundred dollars ($1,100.00) payable sixty (60) days after date, being the cause of action in the case, and that the payment of the promissory note was secured by the assignment of certain choses in action aggreating in amount the sum of fifteen hundred dollars $1,500.00. That the defendant has collected and now holds the amount of the choses in action, to wit; said sum of fifteen hundred dollars. That the loan represented by the promissory note is usurious and in violation of the provisions of section 104A of Chapter 629 of the Acts of 1894, and that the promissory note and the assignment of the choses in action are absolutely null and void. The plaintiff joined issue ou the defendant’s first and second pleas and demurred to the third plea, on the ground that the plea was insufficient in law, and bad in substance.

The Court below sustained tbe demuirer to the third plea, and the defendant declined to plead over. The case was, ⁴⁹⁵ then, submitted to the Court upon an agreed statement of facts, and from a judgment in favor of the plaintiff for $1,047.79 the defendant has taken this appeal. The facts of the ease are few and are set. out in the agreed statement of facts, and are in substance as follows: The defendant is engaged in the business of buying and selling automobiles. On the 10th of January, 1919, he made and executed to the plaintiff his promissory note for $1,100 the note in question payable sixty days after date, on which he received the sum of $1,034.00, the plaintiff deducting therefrom, the sum of eleven dollars for interest and a service charge of $55, or 5%,