Legal Question in Civil Litigation in Illinois

Personal property held by another -- who has liability for loss?

This describes a bailment.

A bailment is the delivery of goods for some purpose, under the understanding that after the purpose has been fulfilled they shall be re-delivered to the bailor (you), or kept till he reclaims them." ( Knapp, Stout & Co. v. McCaffrey (1899), 178 Ill. 107, 52 N.E. 898, aff'd (1900), 177 U.S. 638, 44 L. Ed. 921, 20 S. Ct. 824.) An implied-in-fact bailment is determined by the surrounding facts such as benefits received by the parties, the parties' intentions, the kind of property involved and the opportunity of each party to exercise control over the property.

A bailment for the sole benefit of the bailor is a gratuitous bailment, whereby the bailee voluntarily undertakes possession of the property without compensation. (See Preston v. Prather (1891), 137 U.S. 604, 34 L. Ed. 788, 11 S. Ct. 162; Miles; Skelley v. Kahn (1855), 17 Ill. 169.) The supreme court, in Miles v. International Hotel Co. (1919), 289 Ill. 320, 124 N.E. 599, held that a gratuitous bailment was created when a guest left his goods with an innkeeper after settling his bill.

The rule is that a gratuitous bailee is responsible only for the want of care which is taken by the most inattentive, or in other words, the bailee is responsible only for gross negligence in caring for the goods. The law requires only slight diligence on the part of the bailee, but in every case, good faith requires a bailee without reward to take reasonable care of the deposit; "and what is reasonable care must materially depend upon the nature, value and quality of the thing, the circumstances under which it is deposited, and sometimes upon the character and confidence and particular dealings of the parties."

Here there is much information I do not know (the circumstances of your departure, the words of the promise to care for your things, the length of time you were gone, the length of time it took for you to make arrangements to move the stuff, the circumstances concerning how your things were lost, whether the others knew that your stuff included valuables, etc.). These things could make a difference. Subject to that, you could sue for breach of bailment.

First problem is, who do you sue? For example, when you leave things with five people, which one is responsible to care for the things? The last to touch it? The one who made the promise? All five?

The second problem, a big problem, is proof. How are you going to prove the existence of your collection? It�s gone! Your memory of which cards you had is far less than perfect. Even if you knew of some of the cards, how are you going to prove value? This is not property that lay people know the value of. I very, very much doubt that the court would qualify you as an expert on the value of cards. And you can�t prove value by hearsay evidence, i.e. a book, a letter, an affidavit. You need an expert to testify � and that�s not cheap.