Opinion
No. CV 04-4000487S
June 27, 2006
MEMORANDUM OF DECISION
PROCEDURAL HISTORY
This vigorously contested case came to this court by writ and complaint dated August 4, 2004, wherein the plaintiff alleged several claims against the defendant brokerage firm. All claims have been previously dismissed except the third count which alleges that the defendant breached a contract with the plaintiff.
FINDING OF FACTS
From the evidence adduced at trial, including the reasonable inferences from the evidence and considering the court's evaluation of the credibility of the witnesses, the following relevant facts are found.
On November 14, 1989, the plaintiff's father established a brokerage account with the defendant, Quick Reilly, Inc. ("defendant"), in the plaintiff's name and using the plaintiff's social security number. At the time of the establishment of the account, the plaintiff's father intended to make a gift to the plaintiff of the account.
The account was funded with the proceeds of $30,000 of bonds issued by the Connecticut Housing Finance Authority. At its inception, it had a value of about $30,612.60 and was earning $2,115.00 per year in interest. The defendant, in trial discovery material, claimed that documents relating to the formation of the account were no longer available. The evidence established the total value of the account, including accrued interest, as $52,085.
Prior to the time the account was created, the plaintiff owned no interest, legal or equitable, in those bonds; they were owned exclusively by the father.
The account remained in existence until January 5, 2001 when the funds that had been placed in the account were withdrawn by someone other than the plaintiff and were transferred to a joint account in the name of the plaintiff's father and his brother at Fleet Bank. This new account was given a different social security number.
The first time that the plaintiff became aware of the account's existence was after it had been closed, when the father mailed him a Tax Form 1099 for the 2001 calendar year. The statements for the brokerage account were mailed to the plaintiff's father's address, not to the plaintiff. At the time of the establishment of the account at the defendant brokerage house, the relationship between the plaintiff and his father was good. There had been a prior history of the plaintiff's father creating accounts for other family members who received the benefit of those accounts.
LAW
The plaintiff became the legal owner of the funds in the account once it was placed in his name and social security number. See 9 C.J.S. § 281; 9 C.J.S., Banks and Banking § 281 (1995).
A rebuttable presumption of donative intent exists when the grantee is the natural object of the grantor's bounty. Wright v. Mallett, 94 Conn.App. 789, 792, 894 A.2d 1016 (2006). Our courts have recognized such a presumption between a parent and a child. See Zack v. Guzauskas, 171 Conn. 98, 101 n. 1, 368 A.2d 193 (1976).
Here, there is more than a presumption. The defendant's own documents show the plaintiff as the owner of the account.
CONCLUSION
The account was owned by the plaintiff from the time it was created. The plaintiff was entitled to the interest and the principal from the contract implicit in the relationship between a broker and the owner of an account with the broker. The defendant breached that contract when it transferred the funds to someone other than the plaintiff.
Accordingly, judgment may enter for the plaintiff to recover the value of the account with interest which the evidence established to be $52,085 plus costs.