Don Lloyd Builders, Inc. v. Paltrow, 226-73
| Decision Date | 03 December 1974 |
| Docket Number | No. 226-73,226-73 |
| Citation | 330 A.2d 82,133 Vt. 79 |
| Parties | DON LLOYD BUILDERS, INC. v. Robert W. PALTROW et al. |
| Court | Vermont Supreme Court |
Thomas M. French, Brattleboro, for plaintiff.
Philip R. Rosi, Kristensen, Cummings & Price, and Edward A. Joh, Brattleboro, for defendants.
Before BARNEY, C. J., SMITH, KEYSER, and DALEY, JJ., and SHANGRAW, C. J. (Ret.), Assigned.
The plaintiff brought suit to recover from the defendants its reasonable costs in partially completing a recreational home in Dover, Vermont. An oral construction agreement came to an end when a dispute arose between the parties. The lower court allowed recovery in the amount of $3,909.66, after determining the value of the materials and labor furnished and giving the defendants credits for certain payments.
The sole issue of this appeal relates to the court's determination of certain allowable labor charges as being $4,780.00, based on evidence the defendants assert was improper. They assign as the supporting law for their objection the so-called 'best evidence' rule. This is the rule referred to in Lavalette v. Noyes, 124 Vt. 353, 355, 205 A.2d 413 (1964) where it is described that the rule requiring production of an original document established the provisions it contains, but does not exclude evidence not aimed at the contents of an instrument. It is a rule of preference, relating to written documents, allowing introduction of other evidence of a document's terms where the absence or unavailability of the original is satisfactorily accounted for.
In the present case, the writings involved were timesheets and payroll records for the plaintiff's employees during the period the defendants' house was being constructed. The plaintiff was working on two other construction projects at the same time, and the records did not distinguish the jobs to which the labor time should be charged. As a consequence, the plaintiff's president, after consultation with the foreman, who also testified, gave his testimony as to the labor costs allocable to the building for which recovery is sought. It was to this evidentiary situation that the objection based on the 'best evidence' rule was directed.
In this context, the lower court correctly found that the rule had no application. The exact language or even the particular content of the assorted payroll records and timselips did not define the obligation between the parties and so the preferential rule would not operate to bar evidence deriving from some of the computations those papers contained. The claim of the defendants is the reverse of the one usually made, since direct testimony from witnesses was formerly...
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In re Estate of Maggio
...a particular list does not alone require that list to be introduced before presenting that information”); Don Lloyd Builders, Inc. v. Paltrow, 133 Vt. 79, 81, 330 A.2d 82, 83 (1974) (best evidence rule does not bar oral testimony derived from payroll records where obligation at issue was no......
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State v. Colby, 217-79
...of certain evidence when the absence or unavailability of the original is satisfactorily explained. Don Lloyd Builders, Inc. v. Paltrow, 133 Vt. 79, 80, 330 A.2d 82, 83 (1974). Guidance is found in Federal Rule of Evidence 1004 for expanding this rule of admission to recordings and photogra......
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Pareira v. Wehner
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Vreeland v. Essex Lock & Mfg. Co., Inc., 148-75
...list does not alone reqire that list to be introduced before presenting that information. As we stated in Don Lloyd Builders, Inc. v. Paltrow, 133 Vt. 79, 330 A.2d 82 (1974), the rule is not intended as an exclusionary one; it is merely a rule of preference operating as a special exception ......