Town Ctr. Management Corp v. Chavez

• Decision Date: 03 May 1977
• Docket Number: No. 9805.,9805.
• Citation: 373 A.2d 238
• Parties: TOWN CENTER MANAGEMENT CORPORATION, Appellant, v. Roy CHAVEZ, Appellee.
• Court: D.C. Court of Appeals

373 A.2d 238

TOWN CENTER MANAGEMENT CORPORATION, Appellant, v. Roy CHAVEZ, Appellee.

No. 9805.

District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

Argued October 14, 1976.

Decided May 3, 1977.

Kenneth J. Loewinger, Washington, D. C., for appellant.

B. Michael Rauh and Martin J. Shulman, Washington, D. C., for appellee.

Before FICKLING^* and KERN, Associate Judges, and REILLY, Chief Judge, Retired.

KERN, Associate Judge:

In September 1969 appellee Chavez returned to the furnished apartment in Town Center Plaza Apartments he was renting under a written lease¹ from appellant Town Center Management Corporation (Town Center) and discovered that the management had placed a new lock on his door and removed all his clothing and personal possessions to the building's storeroom. Advised by the resident manager, Mr. Sweeney, that he could have his belongings but not his apartment, appellee consulted his attorney and then commenced in the United States District Court litigation which has culminated in the instant appeal more than seven years after the lockout took place.

The complaint filed on September 24, 1969 in the District Court² alleged that on September 2 appellee had given Town Center written notice that he intended to vacate (to move to another city) on or before October 1; and that without notice he had been evicted on September 23 when appellant's agents entered his apartment, removed all his belongings and placed on the door a new lock to which only Mr. Sweeney had a key. Mr. Chavez sought damages³ and an injunction permitting him to return to his apartment. Denied a temporary restraining order restoring him to possession, he took an emergency appeal to the federal circuit court. That court issued an order stating that Mr. Chavez "has made a reasonably substantial showing of probable success on the merits," summarily reversed the District Court, and granted Mr. Chavez permission, pending determination of his complaint, to enter his apartment. On September 30 Mr. Chavez, accompanied by his attorney, was given access to his apartment after a wait of almost two hours. His property was returned to him and he packed and vacated shortly before midnight.

Town Center not only filed an answer to appellee's complaint in the District Court, but also asserted a counterclaim against him, alleging he had "in a wanton and reckless manner commenced to agitate . . . and interfere with the other tenants" to induce them to breach their contracts with Town Center, and seeking both compensatory and punitive damages against Chavez. Depositions of Chavez and Sweeney were taken and pretrial held; District Judge Gasch dismissed the counterclaim and certified the case to the Superior Court for trial.

Trial was held October 20, 1972. Mr. Chavez and Mr. Sweeney testified for the plaintiff; the defendants called no witnesses in their defense. There was virtually no dispute about the course and chronology of events leading up to the lockout.

In July 1969 there had been a breakdown of the air conditioning in a part of the Town Center Plaza and some tenants, including Mr. Chavez, after several meetings and discussions deducted a percentage of their rent from their August rent payments as an offset.

Town Center, after consulting with its attorney, promptly returned appellee's reduced August check with an explanation that it was not "acceptable."

On September 2 Mr. Chavez gave notice that he intended to vacate his apartment by October 1.

On September 10 Mr. Chavez tendered a check in an amount representing his August and September rent, but again withholding the amount previously decided upon, and also deducting his security deposit; in addition, Mr. Chavez attached a cover letter which explained the deductions he had made and invited discussion concerning the amount of the deductions.

Town Center deposited this check on September 12 and Mr. Sweeney locked Mr. Chavez out of his apartment on September 23.

There was documentary evidence introduced at trial consisting of (a) the lease, (b) Mr. Chavez' September 10th check with the words "August and September Rent" on its face, which reflected that it had been presented to the drawee bank by Town Center and had been paid on September 12, and (c) the letter from Mr. Chavez to Town Center which accompanied that check.

In his lengthy memorandum opinion filed April 2, 1975, the trial judge found that Town Center's acceptance of the September 10th check, (a) after a discussion among its employees (including Sweeney) about the deduction and its surrounding circumstances, (b) without any protest, demand for further payment, or any communication with appellee, and (c) pursuant to the specific advice of its attorneys, constituted an accord and satisfaction. The court thus found the lockout wrongful because appellee "had at the time he was locked out of the premises fully paid his rent." (Record at 231.)

The court further found that Mr. Chavez "was singled out for lock-out action by the defendants, pursuant to and with the advice of counsel . . . apparently for the purpose of making an example of him and thereby discouraging other tenants from taking similar action and making similar reductions." (Record at 233-34.) In addition, the trial judge's conclusion that appellee was "singled out" was supported by his finding that appellee was "somewhat of a leader among the tenants of the building in which his apartment was located." (Record at 234.)

The court finally concluded that the defendants' action in locking [Chavez] out of the premises after having accepted [his] check constituted malicious action on their part in that the action in locking [him] out was taken by and with the advice of counsel . . . so that the Court finds that the defendants acted . . with the knowledge that they had waived their right to do so by accepting [his] tendered rental payment for the months of August and September of 1969 [and that the] defendants' actions were even more malicious for their purpose was to discourage similar action by other tenants in making reductions from the rental otherwise due. [Record at 234-35.]

The court found that appellee's actual expenses incurred as a result of the lockout (for hotel rooms, meals and personal items) totaled $35.51 and that appellee "sustained great mental suffering, inconvenience, and discomfort as a direct result of the defendants' wrongful, unlawful, and malicious action." (Record at 235-36.)

The court awarded actual damages of $10,000 and punitive damages of $5,000, and judgment was entered against Sweeney and Town Center "in the total sum of $15,000.00, plus costs and reasonable attorneys' fees." Subsequently the judge amended the order to reflect his original intention to award $10,000 actual damages and $10,863.17 punitive damages. Included in the latter figure were $5,328 for attorneys' fees and $535.17 for out-of-pocket expenses of the lawsuit. (Record at 255-57.)

Appellant launches four main lines of attack on the judgment awarded. First, it argues that the trial court kept the case under advisement from October 20, 1972 until April 2, 1975 before issuing its findings and conclusions and that this inordinate delay amounts to "plain reversible error."

It seems beyond dispute that holding a case under advisement after trial for almost two and a half years constitutes an aberration of the judicial system. However, we decline to reverse the judgment of the trial court here because we conclude it quite unlikely in this particular case that the delay between the conclusion of the trial and the rendition of the decision affected the ability of the trial judge to make the necessary findings of fact.

In the first place, there were only two witnesses testifying at the trial and the basic facts were not in dispute. Moreover, the pretrial order contained a factual statement of the case which was agreed to by both parties. In addition, there were three written documents received in evidence which encompassed the events leading to the suit. And finally, the record reflects that the judge took his own notes during the trial. Given the relative simplicity of the case, we believe that the facts were sufficiently "memorialized" in the pretrial order, in the documents admitted into evidence, and in the trial judge's notes, that the extraordinary delay in deciding the case did not undermine the trial judge's ability to find the facts.

Moreover, this conclusion is strengthened by the fact that our examination of the transcript discloses that there was ample support for the trial judge's findings⁴

Furthermore, although primary responsibility for the delay must rest with the trial judge, we are constrained to point out that the attorneys for the parties also had an obligation to the judicial system as well as their clients to see that the case was resolved expeditiously. In comparing the conduct of the two parties and their attorneys in this respect, we note that Mr. Chavez, through his attorney, wrote the trial court on three separate occasions and telephoned once, requesting a decision in the case. A copy of each letter was sent to the opposing attorney. The record does not reflect, however, any response from the opposing attorney. After the written requests produced no decision from the court, Mr. Chavez' attorney moved for a new trial on the ground, among others, that his case had been under advisement for almost two and a half years. Appellant did not respond to this motion.⁵ Finally, some three weeks after the filing of the motion, the court issued its memorandum opinion. Thereupon, Mr. Chavez' attorney, again without any response from appellant, withdrew by praecipe his motion for a new trial. In light of appellant's unbroken silence during the long delay, we do not believe that the "sound administration of justice," as appellant now urges,⁶ requires reversal and remand for a new trial in 1977, seven and one-half years after the incident took place and the complaint was...