Ravelo by Ravelo v. Hawaii County, 7937

• Decision Date: 15 February 1983
• Docket Number: No. 7937,7937
• Parties: Christine RAVELO, a minor, and Jennifer Ravelo, a minor, by their Guardians Ad Litem, Benjamin RAVELO and Marlene Ravelo, and Benjamin Ravelo and Marlene Ravelo, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. COUNTY OF HAWAII, a municipal corporation, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: Hawaii Supreme Court

Page 883

658 P.2d 883

66 Haw. 194

Christine RAVELO, a minor, and Jennifer Ravelo, a minor, by their Guardians Ad Litem, Benjamin RAVELO and Marlene Ravelo, and Benjamin Ravelo and Marlene Ravelo, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. COUNTY OF HAWAII, a municipal corporation, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 7937.

Supreme Court of Hawai'i.

Feb. 15, 1983.

Syllabus by the Court

1. A complaint should not be dismissed for failure to state a claim unless it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief.

2. It is the rule that a complaint is not subject to dismissal if plaintiff is entitled to relief under any state of facts which could be proved in support of the claim, and a party shall be granted the relief to which he is entitled even if he has not demanded that relief in his pleadings.

3. On a motion to dismiss, the complaint should be viewed in a light most favorable to the plaintiff; and it should not be dismissed if the allegations could give rise to recovery under alternative theories of relief.

4. When the County informed the applicant for a police officer's position that he would be sworn in several weeks thereafter as a police recruit, the County should reasonably have anticipated that the promise would induce the promisee and his wife to quit their jobs elsewhere and make plans to move their residence. This detrimental reliance could give rise to recovery under the doctrine of promissory estoppel.

5. Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 90 (1979) provides a sounder legal foundation for the application of promissory estoppel than Restatement of Contracts § 90 (1932). Thus relief, if appropriate, may be extended to a third person who acted in reasonable reliance on a promise made to the promisee. But any relief granted the promisee or the third party should not put them in a better position than performance of the promise would have.

Jeffrey Choi, Hilo (Doi, Cook, Choi & Quitiquit, Hilo, of counsel), for plaintiffs-appellants.

Barbara P. Richardson, Deputy Corp. Counsel, Hilo, for defendant-appellee.

Before LUM, Acting C.J., NAKAMURA, PADGETT and HAYASHI, JJ., and MENOR, Retired Justice, in place of RICHARDSON, C.J., disqualified.

NAKAMURA, Justice.

The question in this interlocutory appeal from the Circuit Court of the Third Circuit is whether the complaint filed by Plaintiffs-appellants Benjamin Ravelo and Marlene Ravelo (Mr. and Mrs. Ravelo) against Defendant-appellee County of Hawaii (the County) stated a cause of action upon which relief could be granted. Concluding from a review of the record that the Ravelos' original pleading recited facts that could give rise to a cognizable claim under the promissory estoppel doctrine, see Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 90 (1979), we reverse the circuit court's dismissal of the complaint and remand the case for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.

I.

The controversy stems from the rescission by the County Police Department of a prior acceptance of Benjamin Ravelo's application for employment. The original pleading filed by Mr. and Mrs. Ravelo asserted claims for damages allegedly suffered by themselves and their two minor children; the claims averred on behalf of the children, however, are not at issue in this appeal. ¹

The dispositive allegations of the complaint are: (1) on December 13, 1978, the County Police Department informed Benjamin Ravelo by letter that his application for employment as a police officer had been accepted and he would be sworn in as a police recruit on January 2, 1979; (2) "in reliance" thereon, he resigned from his position as a police officer with the Honolulu Police Department and Mrs. Ravelo submitted a notice of termination to her employer; (3) in further anticipation of a residence change, Mr. and Mrs. Ravelo informed the private school where their children were enrolled that they were being removed from the school; (4) but on December 20, 1978, Benjamin Ravelo "was informed by the Hawaii County Police Department that he was not going to be hired after all"; and (5) Mr. and Mrs. Ravelo thereafter attempted to rescind the resignations submitted to their respective employers but "were informed that it was too late to get their jobs back."

Plaintiffs-appellants claimed the County's "wrongful breach of its agreement to hire Benjamin Ravelo" caused both economic loss and mental anguish and prayed for specific enforcement of such agreement and damages, including large sums for mental anguish and unstated sums for "loss of projected income and related benefits for the rest of the projected lives" of Mr. and Mrs. Ravelo.

After submitting an answer which averred a lack of sufficient knowledge to respond directly to the complaint's principal allegations but nonetheless raised several affirmative defenses, including the Statute of Frauds, Ravelo's breach of a precondition of employment, and his failure to exhaust administrative remedies, the County moved for the dismissal of the complaint or summary judgment. The primary arguments advanced in support of dismissal or summary determination were that the complaint stated no basis upon which relief could be granted for either a breach of contract or a tortious infliction of emotional distress and Ravelo neglected to pursue the appropriate remedy through an administrative appeal to the County Civil Service Commission.

The circuit court agreed that no grounds for relief were pleaded, and dismissed the complaint without prejudice. It adopted the County's reasoning that under applicable provisions of the civil service law and regulations, ² Ravelo was at best a probationary employee whose employment was terminable without cause at any time prior to the completion of a period of probationary service. Thus in the court's view, there was no possible basis upon which damages for either a contractual breach or an infliction of emotional distress could be predicated.

Following the entry of the order dismissing the complaint, plaintiffs-appellants sought a reconsideration of the matter. When this was denied, they moved to amend their complaint. The amended complaint they sought to file, however, essentially reiterated the original allegations, only in much greater detail. Concomitantly with the motion to amend the complaint, plaintiffs-appellants requested leave to pursue an interlocutory appeal to this court in the event the proposed amendment was disallowed. Amendment was denied, but permission to seek interim review was granted.

II.

A.

The circuit court concluded the Ravelos' complaint did not articulate an enforceable claim sounding in contract because Benjamin Ravelo obviously did not attain membership in the County civil service. And as the lack of such status enabled the County to terminate any purported employment with impunity, the court could observe no cause of action for the negligent infliction of emotional distress. We cannot fault the circuit court's perception that the averments in the complaint could not sustain an action premised on a breach of a formal contract or tortious conduct.

Still, our position has been that "a complaint should not be dismissed for failure to state a claim unless it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief." Midkiff v. Castle & Cooke, Inc., 45 Haw. 409, 414, 368 P.2d 887, 890 (1962) (quoting Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 101-2, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957); see also Au v. Au, 63 Haw. 210, 221, 626 P.2d 173, 181 (1981); Hall v. Kim, 53 Haw. 215, 221-22, 491 P.2d 541, 545 (1971). For

[i]t ... is the rule that a complaint is not subject to dismissal if plaintiff is entitled to relief under any state of facts which could be proved in support of the claim, and a party shall be granted the relief to which he is entitled even if he has not demanded that relief in his pleadings. 2 Moore, Federal Practice, § 12.08 (2d ed.); H.R.C.P., Rule 54(c); Territory v. Branco, 42 Haw. 304, 311 [1958]; Yap v. Wah Yen Ki Tuk Tsen Nin Hue, 43 Haw. 37 [1958].

Waterhouse v. Capital Investment Co., 44 Haw. 235, 248-49, 353 P.2d 1007, 1016 (1960). Our duty then is to view the Ravelos' complaint in a light most favorable to them, Gonsalves v. Gilbert, 44 Haw. 543, 554, 356 P.2d 379, 385 (1960), to decide whether the allegations could give rise to recovery under alternative theories of relief. Waterhouse v. Capital Investment Co., 44 Haw. at 248-49, 353 P.2d at 1016.

The allegations recounted earlier state there was a promise of employment extended to Benjamin Ravelo. The Ravelos further maintain they relied on the County's word that Benjamin Ravelo would be sworn in as a police recruit several weeks hence in quitting their jobs and laying plans to move to the Big Island. The County, we believe, could have anticipated the assurance of employment at a definite time would induce a reaction of that nature. These circumstances, in our opinion, provide a basis upon which relief could be granted the Ravelos.

B.

We rest our conclusion on promissory estoppel, the essence of which is detrimental reliance on a promise. See Henderson, Promissory Estoppel and Traditional Contract Doctrine, 78 Yale L.J. 343 (1969). In Anthony v. Hilo Electric Light Co., 50 Haw. 453, 442 P.2d 64 (1968), we concluded the defendant power company was obligated to pay over part of the sums it received from the telephone company to the plaintiff who had applied for telephone service, along with electric service, on the defendant's promise that part of his cost for the installation of telephone service would be refunded when payments made by the telephone company pursuant to the utility companies' "joint pole" agreement were received. We found the promise "induced plaintiff to make a payment for telephone line which he might not have made...