Boothbay Harbor Condominium I v. Whitten

• Decision Date: 28 June 1978
• Citation: 387 A.2d 1117
• Parties: BOOTHBAY HARBOR CONDOMINIUM I et al. v. George D. WHITTEN et al.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 1117

387 A.2d 1117

BOOTHBAY HARBOR CONDOMINIUM I et al. v. George D. WHITTEN et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

June 28, 1978.

Soule & Soule by David B. Soule, Jr. (orally), Wiscasset, for plaintiffs.

Bennett, Kelly & Zimmerman, P.A. by Peter H. Jacobs (orally), John N. Kelly, Portland, for defendants.

Before McKUSICK, C. J., and POMEROY, WERNICK, ARCHIBALD, DELAHANTY, GODFREY and NICHOLS, JJ.

McKUSICK, Chief Justice.

Plaintiffs/appellees in this case are the individual owners of units in the complex known as Boothbay Harbor Condominiums and the association of unit owners known as Boothbay Harbor Condominiums I. The defendants/appellants are the complex's developer, George D. Whitten, and the corporate owner. Between July 6, 1973 and April 26, 1974, the individual plaintiffs purchased from the corporate defendants units in the condominium complex together with appropriate percentage interests in the common areas. Unsatisfied with the condition of their units and the complex in general, the plaintiffs started the present action. Among their specific complaints was the condition of the waste disposal system.

On September 7, 1976, the day on which a jury trial was scheduled to commence, the parties settled the case, and an "Agreement for Docket Entry" was filed on October 6, 1976. ¹ The court on October 19, 1976, issued its judgment, which stated in the part here relevant:

"2. That the Defendants shall obtain from the State of Maine Department of Environmental Protection a waste discharge license certificate in the name of Boothbay Harbor Condominiums I for the waste water treatment plant located on the premises of Boothbay Harbor Condominiums I, Boothbay Harbor, Maine. That the aforesaid license shall be provided to the Plaintiffs no later than six (6) months from the date of entry of this judgment, provided, however, that such license shall be provided to the Plaintiffs at an earlier date upon being required by the Department of Environmental Protection in accordance with its regulations and requirements.

"3. That any repair work or construction to the said waste water treatment plant necessary to obtain the aforesaid license shall be carried out by the Defendants and that he shall have all such work approved by a sanitary engineer employed by the firm Wright, Pierce, Burns and Wyman of Topsham, Maine."

In December the defendants notified the plaintiffs that a waste disposal license had been procured and argued that they thereby had satisfied the terms of the judgment. That license, however, was a conditional one, ² and the plaintiffs contended that the judgment was not satisfied by the mere production of a conditional license, but also required compliance with the license's conditions. When the defendants rejected the plaintiffs' construction of the judgment, plaintiffs moved the court, purportedly pursuant to Rule 70, M.R.Civ.P., to clarify its intentions as expressed in the judgment and to direct the carrying out of the judgment as so clarified, through a third party to be appointed by the court. On January 4, 1977, the same Superior Court justice who had entered the October 19 judgment declared that that judgment "by implication includes the order that Defendant not only obtain a waste discharge license, but do those things necessary to comply with the same." Having so found that the prior judgment already required the defendants to comply with the conditions of the waste discharge license, the justice in his January 4 order went on as follows:

"It is therefore ordered that paragraph two of the judgment in this case be amended by the addition of the following:

"The defendant is further ordered to do any and all acts necessary to repair or replace the existing system in order to comply with the general and special conditions attached to any waste discharge license issued to plaintiffs and laws of the State of Maine in order that the effluent from said system shall meet minimum standards and regulations set by the DEP."

It is from that order that the defendants appeal. ³ We deny the appeal.

On appeal the defendants first contend that the January 4 order was an amendment of the October 19 judgment and as such exceeded the power of the court in that the plaintiffs did not seek any such action from the court until much beyond the ten-day period limited in Rule 59(e), M.R.Civ.P., for a motion to "alter or amend the judgment." See Field, McKusick and Wroth, Maine Civil Practice § 59.4a (2d ed. 1970). Although the Superior Court's January 4 order did in terms direct that the October 19 judgment be "amended," we cannot agree with the defendants in classifying that order as an amendment in the sense that Rule 59(e) refers to altering or amending a judgment. The Superior Court plainly did not use the word "amended" to mean any substantive change in its October 19 judgment; on the contrary, in the very preceding sentence the justice stated that by implication the earlier judgment already included exactly the same ordering provision as he was spelling out in his January 4 order. Rule 59(e) controls by its limited time period any substantive alteration; it does not, however, prevent the court below from settling the dispute that had arisen over the meaning of its own prior judgment. If the court had not gone beyond the first sentence of its January 4 order, it clearly would have done nothing more than construe that judgment. By directing that a sentence be added thereto, the court was merely using a convenient way of setting forth with perfect...