Morals of the Church
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Section — Wouters, Manual of Moral Theology

§ III. On Deposit and Sequestration

877.

I. Notion of deposit. Deposit is a contract by which someone hands over to another a thing to be kept, and the other receives it with the burden of keeping it and afterward returning it in kind.

BailmentDeposit, Sequestration, Commodatum and Precarium

878.

II. Obligations of the depositor. The depositor is bound to reimburse to the depositary the expenses made for conserving and returning the thing.

BailmentDeposit, Sequestration, Commodatum and Precarium

879.

III. Obligations of the depositary. First, the depositary should not inquire what the deposited thing is, if the thing is closed or sealed. Besides this, he is bound:

  1. To keep the deposited thing diligently.

  2. Not to use it without the given or legitimately presumed consent of the one depositing. Consent should not easily be presumed, not even with respect to the use of money, though neither closed nor sealed; indeed not even then, when it could immediately be returned to one who asked. Nevertheless, the depositary, by using a deposited thing neither closed nor sealed, does not sin gravely if he is certain that he will be able to return in due time a thing equally good (St. Alphonsus, III, 748).

  3. To return the thing to the depositor, and this in kind, as soon as it is asked, and together with the fruits which it has produced. It is said:

a) As soon as it is asked; this does not prevent him from retaining the thing until that which must be paid by reason of the deposit has been paid to him. Indeed, with natural law alone considered, it is licit also, observing what must be observed, to compensate oneself from the deposited thing (St. Alphonsus, III, 753).

b) Together with the fruits; except, however, industrial fruits, which the depositary has received, although illicitly, by using the deposited thing.

  1. To what extent the depositary is held for damages arising from juridical fault alone, see n. 1009.

BailmentDeposit, Sequestration, Commodatum and Precarium

880.

IV. Sequestration. Sequestration is a species of deposit by which a litigated thing is deposited with a third party under this law, that afterward it be handed over to him who has emerged victor.

It is distinguished as twofold, conventional and judicial, according as the thing has been deposited by the mutual consent of the litigants, or by order of the judge.

The obligations of the sequestrator are sufficiently clear from the notion itself and from the things said about deposit.

BailmentDeposit, Sequestration, Commodatum and Precarium