Conversion is an intentional tort consisting of "taking with the intent of exercising over the chattel an ownership inconsistent with the real owner's right of possession"."[A] taking with the intent of exercising over the chattel an ownership inconsistent with the real owner's right of possession" (Rolfe B), Fouldes v. Willoughby In England and Wales, it is a tort of strict liability.Kuwait Airways Corp. v. Iraq Airways Co. (No. 4,5,6) Its equivalents in criminal law include larceny or theft and criminal conversion. In those jurisdictions that recognise it, criminal conversion is a lesser crime than theft/larceny.
Many questions concerning joint ownership in enterprises such as a partnership belong in equity, and do not rise to the level of a conversion. Traditionally, a conversion occurs when some chattel is lost, then found by another who appropriates it to his own use without legal authority to do so. It has also applied in cases where chattels were bailed for safekeeping, then misused or misappropriated by the bailee or a third party.
Conversion, as a purely civil wrong, is distinguishable from both theft and unjust enrichment. Theft is obviously an act inconsistent with another's rights, and theft will also be conversion. But not all conversions are thefts because conversion requires no element of dishonesty. Conversion is also different from unjust enrichment. If one claims an unjust enrichment, the person who has another's property may always raise a change of position defense, to say they have unwittingly used up the assets they were transferred. For conversion, there always must be an element of voluntarily dealing with another's property, inconsistently with their rights.
Elements of conversion The elements of conversion are: intent to convert the tangible or intangible property of another to one's own possession and use, the property in question is subsequently converted.Hartford Financial Corp. v. Burns, 96 Cal. App.3d 591, 158 Cal. Rptr. 169, 27 U.C.C.R.S. 831Brown v. Meyer, Gebhart v. D. A. Davidson & Co., 18 Am. Jur.2d Conversion § 2
In another formulation, it has been stated that one claiming conversion must show a tortious conversion of the chattel, a right to property in it, and a right to immediate possession which is absolute, unconditional, and not dependent upon the performance of some act.Jenson v. Chicago & W. I. R. Co., 94 Ill. App.3d 915, 50 Ill Dec. 470,
A common act of conversion in medieval times involved bolts of cloth which were bailed for safekeeping, which the bailee or a third party took and made clothes for their own use or for sale. Other examples of conversion include cutting down trees on someone else's land and removing them without permission or privilege to do so; or taking furniture belonging to someone else, without their consent, and putting it into storage. The use of a patient's body parts after they had been removed in surgery to treat his leukemia raised questions about conversion which were addressed in the case of Moore v. Regents of the University of California, a 1990 landmark Supreme Court of California legal decision.Supreme Court of California, Moore v. Regents of University of California, delivered on 9 July 1990, accessed on 14 February 2026
History of conversion
Conversion has been described as a fascinating tort,Prosser and Keeton, p. 88 albeit one which has largely eluded the attention of legal writers. The literature frequently laps over into that of trover.See Note, 1935, 21 Cornell Law Quarterly 112 Other sources define conversion as a distinct act of dominion wrongfully exerted over another's personal property in denial of or inconsistent with his title or rights therein, or in derogation, exclusion, or defiance of such title or rights, without the owner's consent and without lawful justification.Quaker Oats Co. v. McKibben, Shartzer v. Ulmer, 85 Ariz. 179, De Vries v. Brumback, 53 Cal.2d 643, 2 Cal. Rptr. 764, , 51 A.L.R 146273 A.L.R. 792; 4 A.L.R.3d 1450; 18 Am. Jur. 2d § 1
A conversion occurs when a person does such acts in reference to the personal property of another as amount, in view of the law, to his appropriating the property for himself.Richstein v. Roesch, 71 S.D. 451, , 169 ALR 98 The action probably developed because there was no equivalent form of action in English law to the Roman law rei vindicatio. This was an action in protection of one's property, whereby a claimant could simply allege in court "that's mine!". Early cases of conversion are to be found in 1479, where reference to an even earlier action on the case is made when the defendant "converted" the goods by changing their character, making clothes out of gold cloth.Year Book 18 Edw. IV, f. 23. pl.5 1479
Otherwise, conversion had its origin in the common law action in trover, as a branch of action on the case. The earliest cases are most likely lost. These probably involved cases when the finder of lost goods did not return them to the rightful owner, but used them himself or disposed of them to someone else. It became necessary to invent a new writ which covered the gap between action in trespass which lay for the wrongful taking of a chattel, and detinue which lay for its wrongful detention.
The claim in conversion had become standardized by 1554 in the case of Lord Mounteagle v Countess of Worcester , . The plaintiff was in possession of certain goods, he casually lost them, the defendant found the goods and did not return them, but instead "converted them to his own use."Prosser and Keeton, p. 89
There is a distinction between trover and conversion. Trover resolved the old procedural problem of wager of law which had developed as a form of licensed perjury, which made detinue unattractive to an honest plaintiff suing a dishonest defendant. Wager at law allowed testimony from many witnesses, who might have nothing to do with the actual litigation. In this sense, it was not much different from champerty and maintenance. Because trover sidestepped these old problems, there was an effort to expand it into many different forms. The legal device to accomplish this at first was to treat the allegation of losing the goods and then finding them as a fiction. This method was seen in several cases in the 17th century.Gumbleton v Grafton , Kinaston v Moore , Ratliff v Davies , Isaack v Clark , As a technical factor, the defendant was not permitted to deny losing and finding, so the only issues to be litigated were those of the plaintiff's right to possession and the conversion as an existent fact. With losing and finding no longer essential, trover became the standard remedy for any form of interference with a chattel. It entirely replaced detinue, which fell into complete disuse. It replaced trespass to chattels to such an extent that the former was rarely seen. In 1756, Lord Mansfield stated in Cooper v Chitty ; :
Similar results are seen in other cases from the time.John Williams, Note to Saunders's Reports, Wilbraham v. Snow , The two actions were regarded as alternative remedies for the same wrong. Often, the plaintiff had a choice of action, although there were differences between the choices. Trover must involve a wrongful detention of goods which had not been wrongfully taken, while trespass would not.Put and Hardy v Rawsterne , The theory of trespass was that the plaintiff remained the owner of the chattel, with his possession only interrupted or interfered with, so that when it was tendered back to the plaintiff, he must accept it. The damages must be limited to the loss of use, which could be considerably less than its total value. Trover, which involved lost goods or those placed in a bailment, necessitated full replacement damages. Once the damages were paid, the ownership of the chattel passed to the defendant in trover.
The modern law of conversion crystallised after the case of Fouldes v Willoughby , . Two horses owned by the plaintiff were placed on a river ferry. The horses were put back on the shore by the defendant ferryman. The plaintiff/owner of the horses remained on the ferry and subsequently lost the horses. It was held that this was a trespass, but not a conversion, since there was no interference with the plaintiff's "general right of domination" over the horses.
Property subject to conversion In order for a conversion to occur, it used to need to be lost then found by some other person than the owner. In the process, it was possible that the property could be converted.Ayers v. French 1874, 41 Conn. 142 Chattels converted have included a dog,Graham v. Smith, 1897, 100 Ga. 434, moneyState v. Omaha National Bank, 1899, 59 Neb. 483, and tax receipts.Vaughn v. Wright, 1913, 139 Ga. 736, Land could not be the subject of an action in trover, since it could not be lost, then found and converted. The same was true for sand and gravel, timber, crops and fixtures, so long as they were considered as a part of the land. No action in trover could be had. Once there was severance from the land, these became personal property, and trover could be entertained because of removal from the land.Cage Bros. v. Whiteman, 1942, 139 Tex. 522, Palumbo v. Harry M. Quinn, Inc. 1944, 323 Ill. App. 404, Luhmann v. Shaefer, Mo. App. 1940, Pettigew v. W. & H. Development Co., Fla. App. 1960, Giuliano Construction Co. v. Simmons, 1960, 147 Conn. 441, Smith v. Shiflett, 1965, 66 Wn. 2d 462,
Intangible right Intangible rights could not be lost or found, and the original common law rule was that there could not be a conversion of such. This restriction has been discarded for the most part.Citizens' Bank of Madison v. Shaw, 1909, 132 Ga. 771, Capps v. Vasey Brothers, 1909, 23 Okla. 554, Hoyt v. Stuart, 1915, 90 Conn. 41, Security Bank of Minnesota v. Fogg, 1899, 148 Mass. 273, Griggs v. Day, 1892, 136 N.Y. 152, reh den 137 N.Y. 542, In the absence of contravening evidence, the measure of damages for conversion of a negotiable instrument usually is taken to be its face value.Allied Building Credits v. Grogan Builders Supply Co. Tex. Civ. App. 1983,
Tangible and intangible property The conception that an action for conversion lies only for tangible property capable of being identified and taken into actual possession is based on a fiction by which the action of trover was founded, namely, that the defendant had found the property of another, which was lost. This conception has become, in the progress of the law, something without meaning which has been discarded by most courts.Payne v. Elliot, 54 Cal. 339, 44 A.L.R.2d 92718 Am. Jur.2d Conversion § 7 Therefore, it has been generally accepted that an action for conversion lies for every species of personal property which is the subject of private ownership, whether animate or inanimate.Hooten v. State, 119 Ark. 334, Hartlin v. Cody, 144 Conn. 499, Louisville & N. R. Co. V. Citizens' & Peoples' National Bank, 74 Fla. 385, Vaughn v. Wright, 139 Ga. 736, Graham v. Smith, 100 Ga. 434, Intangible property can be the subject of a conversion in the United States.National Surety Corp. v. Applied Systems, Inc., There cannot be an action in conversion for choses in action or mere debt.Great Commonwealth Life Ins. Co. v. Banco Obrero de Ahorro y Prestamos, Baker v. Brial, Kan. 322, Mossler Acceptance Co. v. Moore, 218 Miss. 757, Computer software can be the subject of a conversion.
Both tangible items and intangible property can be the subject of a claim for conversion under United States law. In Kremen v. Cohen, , when the domain name sex.com was wrongfully transferred to a con man, a claim for conversion was held to be available against the domain name registrar. In English law, however, the recent case of OBG Ltd. v. Allan held intangible property cannot be the subject of a claim for conversion.
Written instruments