Martin v. Jones
Decision Date | 05 August 2015 |
Docket Number | No. 14CA992.,14CA992. |
Citation | 41 N.E.3d 123 |
Parties | Terry MARTIN, Plaintiff/Cross–Appellee, v. Nancy JONES, Defendant–Appellant, and Keavin Hill, Defendant/Cross–Appellant. |
Court | Ohio Court of Appeals |
Robert J. Judkins, Judkins & Hayes, LLC, Greenfield, OH, for appellant.
Joseph P. Sulzer, Chillicothe, OH, for cross-appellant.
John B. Caldwell, Young & Caldwell, LLC, West Union, OH, for appellee.
{¶ 1} Following a lengthy trial the jury returned a verdict finding that Nancy Jones had breached a contract to lease farmland to Terry Martin for 2011 and that Keavin Hill had tortiously interfered with Martin's business relationship with Jones by renting her land that year. The jury awarded Martin compensatory damages for his breach-of-contract claim against Jones, and compensatory damages, punitive damages, and attorney fees for his tortious-interference-with-a-business-relationship claim against Hill. The court overruled Jones's and Martin's postjudgment motions challenging these verdicts and entered a judgment adopting them.
{¶ 2} In Jones's first assignment of error she challenges the trial court's denial of her motion for summary judgment on Martin's breach-of-contract claim. But any error by the trial court in denying her motion was rendered moot or harmless because a subsequent jury trial on the claim established genuine issues of material fact.
{¶ 3} In Jones's second assignment of error she asserts that the trial court erred in denying her motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict, which found that she breached her contract. However, there was sufficient evidence establishing that the parties entered into a binding oral contract, notwithstanding some lack of specificity regarding the rental price, which was supplied by the parties' course of dealing. Nor did the statute of frauds invalidate the oral lease, because Martin's part performance of the contract—by spraying the farmland with herbicide, purchasing fertilizer and seed, entering into corn contracts, and leasing an additional tractor—removed the lease from the operation of the statute. Jones was not entitled to judgment notwithstanding the verdict on Martin's claim for breach of contract. Jones's related argument in her third assignment of error contesting the denial of her motion for new trial fails for similar reasons.
{¶ 4} In Jones's fourth assignment of error she contends that the trial court erred in denying her motion for remittitur1 seeking a reduced amount of damages. The trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying her motion because the jury verdict awarding Martin damages for her breach of their oral lease agreement was supported by Martin's calculation of lost profits, which included a sum of $12,000 for leasing an additional tractor that was needed under the lease.
{¶ 5} In Hill's first assignment of error he claims that the trial court erred in denying his motion for summary judgment. Because Hill now concedes that he did not file a motion for summary judgment, we reject his claim.
{¶ 6} In Hill's second assignment of error he asserts that the trial court abused its discretion by denying his motions for directed verdict and judgment notwithstanding the verdict on Martin's claim that Hill tortiously interfered with Martin's business relationship with Jones. There was sufficient evidence of an oral contract for Martin to lease Jones's farmland in 2011. Because the oral lease was not terminable at will, Hill could not rely on the privilege of fair competition to justify his interference with the business relationship. Hill was not entitled to a directed verdict or judgment notwithstanding the verdict on Martin's tortious-interference claim.
{¶ 7} In Hill's third assignment of error he argues that the damages awarded against him were against the manifest weight of the evidence. Hill invited any error in the trial court's adoption of the jury verdict against him of $2,175 in compensatory damages because his trial counsel advised the court that this sum was “commensurate with his liability” and “fair and proper.” And the record includes evidence that neither the jury nor the trial court lost its way in assessing $45,000 in punitive damages against Hill based on his conscious disregard of Martin's rights to farm Jones's farmland in 2011.
{¶ 8} Finally, in Hill's fourth assignment of error he asserts that the trial court erred in awarding attorney fees against him because there was no evidence submitted on the reasonableness of those fees. Hill forfeited this claim on appeal by stipulating to the amount of attorney fees incurred by Martin and stipulating it could be submitted to the jury for its consideration. Because the contentions raised in Jones's appeal and Hill's cross-appeal are meritless, we affirm the judgment of the trial court.
{¶ 9} Martin filed a complaint in the Adams County Court of Common Pleas against Jones and Hill. In an amended complaint Martin raised claims that Jones breached an oral lease agreement for Martin to farm her land in 2011, that Jones was liable to him based on promissory estoppel, and that Hill and his business, Hills Agri–Tech Services, Inc., tortiously interfered with Martin's business relationship with Jones. Jones and Hill filed answers and counterclaims alleging that Martin had tortiously interfered with Jones's business relationship with Hill.
{¶ 10} Jones filed motions for summary judgment, which the trial court denied. The case proceeded to a jury trial, which produced the following evidence.
{¶ 11} Martin is an Adams County resident who has farmed for over 30 years. He farms real property he owns as well as other land he leases in four different counties. In 1998, he asked Jones, a retired schoolteacher who owns a farm in Adams County with approximately 150 acres of farmland, whether he could lease her property to farm. Jones's property had last been farmed about 10–15 years before so it was overrun with weeds. They reached an oral agreement for Martin to lease Jones's farmland in 1999 for $50 per acre. The only condition specified by Jones was that if her son wanted to come back and farm her property, they would have to negotiate a different arrangement.
{¶ 12} Martin continued to lease Jones's farm on a year-to-year basis for the next 12 years, through 2010. Martin delivered the annual rent to Jones in two different installments—the first in the spring of the year before he started planting and the second in the fall of the year following the harvest. According to Martin, they always agreed on the lease of Jones's farm for the following year in the fall of the preceding year when he delivered the second check. This practice of leasing farmland for the next year by reaching an agreement in the fall of the preceding year was consistent with the general practice, which permitted farming tenants to determine what equipment, seed, and fertilizer they needed for the upcoming year before they planted the crops.
{¶ 13} Martin testified that the lease agreement was never for a specific price; instead, it followed from what was the year before, unless Jones told him in the fall of the preceding year that she wanted more money or Martin decided to pay her more based on increases in area rental and grain prices. The annual rent Martin paid fluctuated from $7,000 in 1999 to $11,500 in 2010.
{¶ 14} When Martin farmed Jones's property in 2010, there was a problem with marestail, an invasive weed. By early August 2010, Martin had sprayed the property three times to kill the weeds. According to Martin, around that time he told Jones that he was going to have to spray the property again to get rid of the weeds and that he would have to plant corn the next year—2011. Jones advised Martin that she did not care what he planted on her farmland. Martin paid Winchester Ag $2,175 to spray herbicide on Jones's farmland in November 2010 in preparation for his planting of corn on the property in 2011.
{¶ 15} In early December 2010, Martin delivered his second rental payment for 2010 to Jones. Martin testified that at this time, he told Jones that they wouldn't have a problem with the weeds next year because of the November spraying of herbicide and that he would be ready to plant corn in 2011. Jones told him that she would see him next spring. According to Martin, they talked about renting her farmland for 2011 at that time and they entered into a verbal lease agreement for the next crop year.
{¶ 16} Jones testified that she never agreed to lease Martin her farmland in 2011 and that during 2010 she had expressed her dissatisfaction with Martin's repeated spraying of chemicals on her property and her perception that the rent he was paying was below the fair market value. She claimed that Martin told her that if she could find someone to rent her land for a higher price, she should. Conversely, Martin testified that Jones never expressed dissatisfaction with his farming practices, including the spraying of chemicals, or that she thought her farmland was worth more. He also denied telling her that she could rent her land to someone else if they offered a higher rental price.
{¶ 17} Based in part on his conversations with Jones, Martin ordered seed and fertilizer and entered into contracts to supply 40,000 bushels of corn for 2011. He also leased an additional tractor for 2011 because of the agreement to farm Jones's land.
{¶ 18} In December 2010, Jones met with Hill in Portsmouth after they had been brought together by a mutual acquaintance. At that meeting Jones expressed her dissatisfaction with Martin's application of chemicals to her farmland and the low rent he was paying. Hill, who was interested in “getting his foot in the door” of Adams County farming, offered to rent Jones's farm sight unseen for $140 an acre in 2011, which was significantly more than Martin had been paying her. Although Jones was excited about the offer, she refused it.
{¶ 19} Martin proceeded to take actions...
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