McCoy v. Brooks (1905)
Citation: 9 Ariz. 157, 80 P. 365 · Court: Arizona Territorial Supreme Court · Decided: March 30, 1905.
Facts
An execution for a debt and costs of approximately USD 324 resulted in sale of 347,000 mining-company shares, valued on the evidence at approximately USD 52,000, in one lot for USD 350. The officer refused the debtor’s tender before delivering the bill of sale. The debtor moved three days after the sale; the trial court set it aside and the purchaser appealed. These are historical case facts, not present-day statutory amounts or deadlines.
Holding
Affirmed. Price inadequacy ordinarily does not alone invalidate an execution sale, but a price so inadequate as to shock the conscience can justify relief. Excessive sale of property beyond what the judgment required and the refused tender reinforced the equitable grounds here. This was a genuine personal-property stock execution sale, not a real-estate foreclosure analog.
Reasoning
The court considered the extreme disparity, unnecessary sale of all the stock, and surrounding inequitable circumstances together. It upheld the trial court’s exercise of discretion. Read the full court-authored text, not the mirror’s editorial labels, as the source for this account.
Practical impact
- Grossly inadequate price can expose a personalty execution purchaser to set-aside; a low price is not automatically enough in every case.
- The three-day motion was a fact, not a holding establishing a current three-day limitations period.
- The 1901 procedural provisions discussed in the opinion must not replace current notice, payment or judgment-relief rules.
Good-law status
Bounded later treatment: smith-v-arizona-engineering-co-1920 applied the standard but found inadequate proof of sale-date value. The full later opinion Wiesel v. Ashcraft, 26 Ariz. App. 490, 549 P.2d 585 (1976) expressly discusses both stock cases in a real-property execution dispute. That confirms later use, not exhaustive citator clearance or survival of every historical procedure. Current procedural deadlines and comprehensive negative-treatment review remain needs_verification.
Applies in →
arizona · personal-property-execution-sales-by-state
Sources
- {case, https://openjurist.org/9/ariz/157/mccoy-v-brooks, retrieved 2026-10-17} — complete court-authored opinion on a nonofficial mirror, independently read.
- {case, https://openjurist.org/21/ariz/624/smith-v-arizona-engineering-co, retrieved 2026-10-17} — complete later opinion read for treatment, not just a citation hit.
- {case, https://openjurist.org/26/arizapp/490/wiesel-v-ashcraft, retrieved 2026-10-17} — full later opinion read; realty context distinguished.
This page provides general legal information, not legal advice. Verify the holding and its current treatment against the primary source and consult a licensed Arizona attorney before acting. Last verified: 2026-10-17.