Granada Mills Incorporation v Slack

• Jurisdiction: Saint Kitts and Nevis
• Court: High Court (Saint Kitts and Nevis)
• Judge: Glasgow, J.
• Judgment Date: 01 January 1969
• Neutral Citation: KN 1969 HC 6
• Docket Number: No. 1 of 1969
• Date: 01 January 1969

High Court

Glasgow, J.

No. 1 of 1969

Granada Mills Incorporation

and

Slack

Appearances:

F.C. Adam for plaintiff

F.E. Kelsick for defendant.

Conflict of laws. - Proper law of contract

Debt. - Debtor and Creditor

Facts: The plaintiff was a company in Puerto Rico which claimed a sum of money being the balance due and owing on the price of goods sold and delivered to the defendant, a merchant in Nevis. The question was which law should apply.

Facts: The plaintiff was a company in Puerto Rico which claimed $719.04 being the balance due and owing on the price of goods sold and delivered to the defendant a merchant in Nevis. Whether the defendant was liable.

Held: That the proper law of the contract was the law of Nevis.

Held: That the plaintiff was entitled to recover the debt since the contract was not an illegal one but was made merely to avoid taxes. Judgment given for the plaintiff.

Glasgow, J.

1 The plaintiff's claim against the defendant is for the sum of $719.04 in the currency of the United States of America, being the balance alleged to be due and owing on the price of goods sold and delivered by the plaintiff to and at the request of the defendant during the month of October 1967.

2 In his Statement of Defence the defendant stated that he “does not admit owing the sum of $719.04¢ to the plaintiff or any other sum for goods sold and delivered as alleged in the Statement of Claim ox at all”. The defendant also stated that he purchased goods from the plaintiff in the month of October, 1967 and received delivery of the same but that “he paid and satisfied to the plaintiff in full the agreed purchase price of the same”. In the final paragraph of his Defence the defendant denied that he is indebted to the plaintiff in the amount claimed or at all for goods supplied as alleged of at all.

3 The facts of the case are briefly, as follows: The plaintiff is a Company incorporated in Puerto Rico. It manufactures ladies' and children's underwear. The defendant is a merchant who resides and carries on business in Charlestown in the Island of Nevis. The defendant has been carrying on business as a merchant in Nevis for about 25 years. On the 30 ^th October 1967, while the defendant was in Puerto Rico, the defendant bought from the plaintiff finished merchandise for which the defendant had to pay the plaintiff $1,235.52 U.S. The defendant gave the plaintiff a cheque dated 30 ^th October 1967 drawn on Barclays Bank D.C.O., Charlestown, Nevis for $719.04 U.S., and later requested the Plaintiff's Secretary to...