Patel v. Duke Hospitality, LLC

• Decision Date: 28 June 2022
• Docket Number: A22A0277
• Citation: 364 Ga.App. 538,875 S.E.2d 520
• Parties: PATEL v. DUKE HOSPITALITY, LLC et al.
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals

364 Ga.App. 538

875 S.E.2d 520

PATEL

v.DUKE HOSPITALITY, LLC et al.

A22A0277

Court of Appeals of Georgia.

June 28, 2022

John A. Christy, Jonathan Andrew Akins, Atlanta, for Appellant.

Cary Ichter, Atlanta, James W. Hawkins, William Daniel Davis, for Appellee.

Rickman, Chief Judge.

After he was removed from his position as an officer of Duke Hospitality, LLC, Dhansukh T. Patel filed a lawsuit against Duke and its Vice President and managing member, Joseph Tyler Collum, alleging that Collum, on Duke's behalf, unlawfully accessed his personal email account and took and/or deleted data from that account. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Duke and Collum on all claims. Because the record evidence establishes that disputed issues of fact remain that are material to the resolution of Patel's claims, we reverse.

Summary judgment is proper only "if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law[.]" OCGA § 9-11-56 (c).

Summary judgments enjoy no presumption of correctness on appeal, and an appellate court must satisfy itself de novo that the requirements of OCGA § 9-11-56 (c) have been met. In our de novo review of the grant or denial of a motion for summary judgment, we must view the evidence, and all reasonable inferences drawn therefrom, in the light most favorable to the nonmovant.

(Citation and punctuation omitted.) JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. v. Cronan , 355 Ga. App. 556, 558-559, 845 S.E.2d 298 (2020).

So construed, the evidence shows that Patel founded and was an officer and minority owner of Duke, a hotel management company. Duke managed certain hotels of which Patel was an owner and/or investor. Patel alleges that the majority owners, which included Collum and two of Collum's relatives, orchestrated a fraudulent merger and on May 21, 2020, forcefully removed him from his position as an officer of Duke.

Collum used Patel's work computer to gain access to his email accounts. Although Collum asserts that he did so for the purpose of suspending Patel's work email account after he was removed, Patel presented evidence that Collum did so while he was still an officer of Duke and before he had been removed. Regardless, while using Patel's computer, Collum gained access to both Patel's work and personal email accounts, which could be viewed simultaneously.

While viewing both of Patel's email accounts, Collum discovered that Patel had sent several emails with attached telephone recordings from his work account to his personal account. Collum listened to those recordings and contends that they were work-related conversations between Patel and himself and other Duke members. Collum also discovered that Patel had sent the telephone recordings to a third-party who was not employed by Duke.

Collum forwarded the emails that had been sent to the third-party with the attached recordings to himself, then deleted evidence that he had done so from Patel's "Sent" file. He then changed Patel's login credentials to both his work and his personal email accounts so that Patel could not longer gain access to either. Patel lost access to his personal email account from May 21, 2020 until June 9, 2020.

Patel subsequently filed the instant action against Duke and Collum, alleging various violations of the Georgia Computer Systems Protection Act ("GCSPA"),¹ including computer theft,² computer trespass,³ computer invasion of privacy,⁴ and computer forgery⁵ ; invasion of privacy; and conversion.⁶ The lawsuit sought monetary damages, civil penalties,⁷ injunctive relief, and attorney fees and costs.

Duke and Collum filed a motion for summary judgment, asserting that they were entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Specifically, they contended that summary judgment was proper on Patel's claims for computer crimes and invasion of privacy because Patel's receipt of Duke's Employee Handbook authorized them to access his email accounts and waived any expectation of privacy in his computer or its contents; Patel's claim for conversion failed as a matter of law because they returned Patel's access to his email account; and that his claim for injunctive relief was moot because Patel's email account remained intact and they no longer had access to it. The trial court granted the motion.

Patel appeals, contending that disputed issues of material fact remain as to each of his claims, rendering summary judgment improper. We agree and reverse.⁸

Claims for violations of the GCSPA and Invasion of Privacy. In its order granting summary judgment in favor of Duke and Collum on Patel's civil claims for violations of the GCSPA and invasion of privacy, the trial court relied exclusively on Duke's Employee Handbook, which expressly authorized Duke to access the email systems and communications within those systems of its employees, and provided that its employees had no legitimate expectation of privacy in those systems. In its summary judgment order, the trial court stated as a matter of fact that "Patel acknowledged receipt of his personal copy of Defendant Duke's Employee Handbook[.]"

Nevertheless, in opposition to the summary judgment motion, Patel filed an affidavit in which he expressly denied having received and/or acknowledged receipt of the Employee Handbook, and claimed that the electronic signature on the acknowledgment of receipt page submitted by Duke and Collum was a forgery. Patel further presented evidence that the electronically-signed acknowledgment page was dated in 2014, but that the Employee Handbook to which it was purportedly attached was created in 2017.

This evidence was sufficient to create a genuine issue of material fact as to whether Patel received the Employee Handbook, and whether it effectively authorized Duke and Collum to access Patel's personal email account and waived Patel's right to privacy in that account.⁹ Accordingly, the trial court's grant of summary judgment on these claims was not supported by the record evidence. See OCGA § 9-11-56 (c).

Conversion. With respect to Patel's claim for conversion, the trial court recognized that "refusal by the other party to return the property" is an essential element of conversion, see Trey Inman & Assoc., 306 Ga. App. at 457 (4), 702 S.E.2d 711, and then granted summary judgment after concluding that "it is now undisputed that Duke and Collum ‘returned’ Patel's access to his personal email account."

The record shows that Patel disputes that full access to his email account was restored. He alleges that he remains unable to determine the number of messages that Collum deleted and/or forwarded without his authority due to the deleted "Sent" files, and that he learned through discovery that Collum had deleted more emails than he had previously admitted. Patel also alleges that he suffered damage to his business relationships and investments during the period of time that he was denied access to his personal email account.

Under these circumstances, we cannot say that Patel's claim for conversion fails as a matter of law on the grounds raised and ruled on by the trial...