Voulgaris v. Press, 1659.

• Decision Date: 15 September 1955
• Docket Number: No. 1659.,1659.
• Parties: John VOULGARIS, Appellant, v. Julius N. PRESS and Lillian S. Press, Appellees.
• Court: D.C. Court of Appeals

116 A.2d 691

John VOULGARIS, Appellant, v. Julius N. PRESS and Lillian S. Press, Appellees.

No. 1659.

Municipal Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

Argued August 22, 1955.

Decided September 15, 1955.

Jacob A. Stein, Washington, D. C., for appellant.

Allan L. Kamerow, Washington, D. C., with whom Stanley H. Kamerow, Washington, D. C., was on the brief, for appellees.

Before CAYTON, Chief Judge, and HOOD and QUINN, Associate Judges.

CAYTON, Chief Judge.

Appellant Voulgaris operated a restaurant in property which he held under a ten-year lease. Early in 1954, when the lease had run some eight years, District of Columbia officials served a condemnation notice on the owners, requiring them to make extensive repairs to the building or demolish it. The owners made the required repairs and for the three months the work was in progress, commencing in June 1954, lessee suspended the operation of his restaurant business. He paid rent for those months and then brought suit against the lessors to recover the amounts paid. The decision of the trial court was against him and he brings the case here on appeal.

Appellant has based his claim for reversal on the ground that it was lessors' obligation to keep the building in repair, that failure to discharge such obligation resulted in the condemnation proceedings by the District government and deprived lessee of the use of the leased property. Lessors answer that it was lessee's obligation to make repairs under an express provision of the lease. We do not reach that issue because we think we are required to affirm on a different ground, which has been raised by lessors. Their contention is that because appellant made the payments voluntarily he has no right to sue for their return.

Appellees' position is sound. It has always been the law that monies voluntarily paid with full knowledge of the surrounding facts and circumstances, though paid under a mistaken view of the law, cannot be recovered. Lamborn v. Dickinson, 97 U.S. 181, 24 L.Ed. 926; MacNamee v. Hermann, 60 App.D.C. 295, 53 F.2d 549; 70 C.J.S., Payment, § 133, et seq.¹

It is true, as appellant points out, that the rule is subject to many exceptions, Columbian Nat. Life Ins. Co. v. Goldberg, 6 Cir., 158 F.2d 971, certiorari denied 331 U.S. 820, 67 S.Ct. 1310, 91 L.Ed. 1837, but there is nothing in the record before us which would permit invoking any exception to the established rule. We have nothing to go on except appellant's testimony that he "could not conduct a restaurant business in these premises because of repair operations being undertaken during this period by the defendant landlords as the result of a condemnation proceeding then pending against these premises." As to payment, the record shows nothing except that plaintiff paid the...