Mahona-Jojanto, Inc., N. S. L. v. Bank of New Mexico
| Decision Date | 08 July 1968 |
| Docket Number | No. 8547,INC,MAHONA-JOJANT,8547 |
| Citation | 442 P.2d 783,1968 NMSC 110,79 N.M. 293 |
| Parties | , N. S. L., a New Mexico Corporation, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. BANK OF NEW MEXICO, a New Mexico Corporation, Defendant-Appellee. |
| Court | New Mexico Supreme Court |
This action was predicated upon the publication of an allegedly libelous letter. The trial court, based upon depositions and affidavits in the file, granted summary judgment in favor of the defendant. Plaintiff appealed, claiming there were genuine issues of material fact and that summary judgment was improper.
Prior to August 1, 1966, the plaintiff was negotiating with an agency of the federal government in an effort to obtain a contract for the manufacture of several thousand pairs of combat pants. Anticipating that additional financing would be required, plaintiff requested a meeting be held on August 1, 1966, at which representatives of the plaintiff, of the bank, and certain officials of the Small Business Administration be present. Although no formal application had been made to the Small Business Administration, the purpose of the meeting was to consider a request by the plaintiff for a revolving loan in the amount of $175,000.00 to finance the contract. At this meeting, the bank's representatives stated that they were dissatisfied with the plaintiff's performance with respect to a current debt and that the bank would not be inclined to lend more funds. Thereupon, representatives of the plaintiff offered to furnish the bank a projection of costs and other factors involved in the performance of the proposed contract, and the bank agreed that it would withhold a final decision with respect to either financing a loan or acting as a participant with the Small Business Administration. On August 17th, plaintiff entered into the contract with the federal government to manufacture the trousers. Subsequent to this and to the meeting, plaintiff furnished the projection, and, on August 26th, the bank decided to decline the loan. Based upon this decision, the following letter was written, addressed to the president of the plaintiff, and copies were sent to plaintiff's then attorney and to 'Bill Williams, Small Business Administration':
'We have reviewed in detail your application for financing the Government contract you have been awarded and wish to advise you that we are not interested in either a direct loan or on a participation with the Small Business Administration.
'The principal reasons for our decision are the past history of the company, the total risk for the processing of the contract is placed on borrowed funds, and we are not confident of the company's ability to perform on this contract which is far in excess of any volume the company has ever handled.
'We do appreciate the opportunity to review this request.
'Very truly yours,
/s/ A. J. Morris
A. J. Morris
Vice President
'ajm/ah
'cc: T. R. Montoya, Esq.
When the copy of the letter was received by the Small Business Administration, one of its employees underlined with a red pencil all that appeared in the second paragraph commencing with the words 'the total risk.'
On October 4th, plaintiff submitted its formal loan application to the Small Business Administration, and the same was denied. As a result, plaintiff was forced to subcontract the government contract, with the resultant claimed loss of profits. This suit was filed on November 30th.
The bank's motion for summary judgment was based upon three distinct grounds: (1) the assertions in the letter were true; (2) that the transmittal of the copy of the letter was motivated by the bank's understanding that it was required by the Small Business Administration's regulations and was requested by the plaintiff; and (3) that the sending of the copy of the letter was not the cause of the declination of the loan, therefore did not cause the subcontracting, and that there was no competent evidence to the contrary. All of these points are reargued before us, but need not be individually determined.
There need be no citation of authority that with respect to the granting of summary judgment: all doubts as to the existence of a genuine issue of fact must be resolved against the the movant, and that affidavits and depositions on file must be appraised in the...
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