Williams v. Benson

This appeal requires a prolegomenon of sorts, dealing as it does with two somewhat mystical realms of the law. Couple these with a unique fact situation and the reader will soon see why prefatory stage-setting is necessary before an exhaustive dissertation is appropriate.

The two propositions referred to are these: first, whether fraud may consist of simply remaining silent when a duty to speak is found; and second, whether fraud under these circumstances can look to the results of the conduct rather than to the state of mind of the alleged wrongdoer.

Further narrowing the problem before us, we…