John Boyle wrote:
In message . com, Dave
writes

John Boyle wrote:
In message .com, Dave
writes
So if I got 5K in cash to buy a car at an auction, got the serial
numbers, and was robbed, if the money turned up at a bank 3 months
later I would have lost ownership?

In many respect bank notes are like bills of exchange in which title
passes by delivery. A subsequent holder of the note would obtain good
title especially if he had given value for it.
This doesn't seem right,
My point was that the title may have been obtained illegally (e.g.
street robbery), so the original holder should retain title.

No, a subsequent holder of a bill can develop the paramount title as a
'holder in due course' so long as the bill carries no restrictive
crossing and so long as it is taken in good faith by the holder without
any notice of a defect in title of the transferor and for value and
therefore oit is possible for the holder to acquire a better title than
the transferor.

It sounds
like an essay for a law student.

Quite. the point about bank notes is covered quite explicitly in Miller
v Race in which a bank refused to honour one of its notes that had been
stolen and had subsequently found its way to the plaintiff who acquired
it quite legitimately and in good faith. It was held that the bank was
still liable to the plaintiff on the note.
--
John Boyle
Thank you for your informative post. This leads onto a couple of
issues, the first of which may be worthy of a top level post in
uk.legal.
What about other countries in Europe do they all apply the same ruling?
i.e. harmonization of case law across the EU. This may be especially
relevant if the UK starts using the Euro.

Miller v Race was in 1758, so presumably the ruling applies to the US
as well. However this was in the days of the gold standard, and could
be outdated. Today money is just a general swindle so a modern jury or
judge may find that both parties have a valid claim and should be paid
equally to the full amount. Is the only way to overturn case law to
pass an act of parliament?