Cookman v. Champlain Valley Plumbing & Heating

• Docket Number: 23-AP-075
• Decision Date: 15 September 2023
• Parties: Claire Cookman* v. Champlain Valley Plumbing & Heating
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court

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Claire Cookman* v. Champlain Valley Plumbing & Heating

No. 23-AP-075

Supreme Court of Vermont

September 15, 2023

In the case title, an asterisk (*) indicates an appellant and a double asterisk (**) indicates a cross-appellant. Decisions of a three-justice panel are not to be considered as precedent before any tribunal.

APPEALED FROM: Superior Court, Addison Unit, Civil Division CASE NO. 103-6-18 Ancv Trial Judge: Mary Miles Teachout

ENTRY ORDER

In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:

Plaintiff appeals from the trial court's denial of her motion for a new trial. She argues that the jury should have awarded her monetary damages on her complaint. We affirm.

The record indicates the following. In January 2018, defendant made a delivery of oil to plaintiff's home. Plaintiff had disconnected the oil tank, and eighty-five gallons of home heating oil spilled into plaintiff's basement. Defendant engaged in immediate remediation efforts and hired a professional environmental cleanup company to address the spill. Plaintiff later sued defendant, arguing that she incurred damages due to defendant's negligence in spilling the oil and cleaning up the oil. Plaintiff sought to recover monetary damages for personal property in the basement, soil contamination, damage to her sewer pipes, and damage to her home in general. Plaintiff also alleged that the value of her property had been permanently diminished due to the oil spill. Following a trial, a jury found the parties equally negligent; it found both defendant and plaintiff to be the proximate cause of injury to plaintiff. The jury further determined that plaintiff failed to prove that she suffered any monetary damages proximately caused by defendant's negligence.

Plaintiff moved for a new trial or, alternatively, for additur. She maintained that the evidence did not show that she was negligent and that it was inconceivable that she suffered no monetary damages. The court denied plaintiff's motion. It found that both negligence liability and monetary damages depended largely on the jury's credibility assessments. Plaintiff had proved negligence on defendant's part and the court found sufficient evidence to support the jury's determination that plaintiff was equally negligent. It cited the conflicting evidence about whether plaintiff notified defendant that the tank was disconnected as well as evidence that plaintiff had not capped the fill pipe to prevent delivery. The court emphasized that it was for the jury to resolve these conflicts and weigh the evidence.

As to the absence of a monetary damage award, plaintiff asserted that despite the prompt cleanup of the spill, she sustained damages based on projected future cleanup costs for residual oil on surfaces in the house, loss of value of her real estate, loss of personal property, and loss of the enjoyment of her property. The court found that all evidence in support of these claims came from plaintiff through her own testimony and it reiterated that it was the jury's responsibility to assess plaintiff's credibility. The jury's verdict indicated that it found plaintiff's evidence of additional damages insufficiently credible to meet her burden of proof. The court thus denied plaintiff's motion. This appeal followed.

Plaintiff argues that the evidence compelled the jury to award her monetary damages. She further contends that the jury's decision was inconsistent with its finding that defendant's negligence was a proximate cause of injury to her. Plaintiff acknowledges that the jury must assess the weight and credibility of the evidence, but she notes that she presented photographic evidence in support of her request for damages in addition to her testimony. She also cites testimony from defendant's witnesses that she believes supports her position.

The trial court has discretion in ruling on a motion for a new trial. Epsom v. Crandall, 2019 VT 74, ¶ 17, 211 Vt. 94. "When reviewing the trial court's denial of a motion for a new trial or for additur on the grounds that the jury's award is unsupported by the evidence, we need only determine whether the jury could reasonably have found its verdict for damages on the evidence before it." Id. (quotation omitted). Because "[t]he law favors upholding jury verdicts," "we view the evidence in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party." Id. (quotations omitted). "In reviewing the trial court's disposition of a motion for a new trial, this Court is bound to accord to the ruling all possible presumptive support." Weeks v. Burnor 132 Vt. 603, 609 (1974).

The court here instructed the jury in relevant part that:

The term "damages" refers to the total sum in dollars for the harm or loss that you find have been proximately caused by the defendant's negligent conduct. Damages for a claim such as this are awarded on a theory of compensation. They are intended to put the plaintiff in the same position she would be in if the conduct giving rise to the claim had not occurred. The law in Vermont is that if a plaintiff is entitled to recover, she is entitled to recover for the damages that are shown to have resulted from the wrong done by the defendant to the plaintiff. The plaintiff is not entitled to be put in a better position than she would have been in had there been no wrongful conduct on the part of the defendant.

. . . .

You shall award damages only for those harms or losses that you find the plaintiff has proven by a preponderance of the evidence, and which are the direct result of negligent conduct of the defendant. That is, you may not award actual damages for any harm or loss suffered by the plaintiff that may have resulted from a different cause. You must award actual damages only for those harms or losses that were proximately caused by the negligent conduct of the defendant.

The evidence here allowed the jury to reasonably conclude that plaintiff was not entitled to any monetary damages from defendant's negligence, that is, to conclude that although her property was damaged, she suffered no harm or loss proximately caused by defendant's conduct because she was made whole by defendant's remediation. The jury's conclusion was not inconsistent with its finding that defendant's negligence was a proximate cause of injury to plaintiff and that plaintiff was also a proximate cause of injury to herself. Plaintiff had the burden to "prove, by a preponderance of the evidence, the extent and nature of [her]...