Case Title: Thompson v. Meyers

Citation: 211 Kan. 26, 505 P.2d 680

Docket Number: 46,495

State: kansas

Court: Kansas Supreme Court

Date: 1973-01-20T00:00:00Z

Document:
211 Kan. 26 (1973)
505 P.2d 680
L.V. THOMPSON, Appellee,
v.
KEITH L. MEYERS and FRED W. REUST, Appellants.
No. 46,495

Supreme Court of Kansas.
Opinion filed January 20, 1973.
William E. Enright, of the firm of Scott, Quinlan & Hecht, of Topeka, argued the cause, and Robert D. Hecht and Jack A. Quinlan, of the same firm, were with him on the brief for the appellants.
Arthur Palmer, of the firm of Goodell, Casey, Briman, Rice & Cogswell, of *27 Topeka, argued the cause, and Glenn D. Cogswell, of the same firm, was with him on the brief for the appellee.
The opinion of the court was delivered by
FONTRON, J.:
This is an action to recover money alleged to be due under a written contract. The trial court entered judgment in favor of the plaintiff, L.V. Thompson, and the defendants, Meyers and Reust, have appealed. The parties will be designated either as plaintiffs and defendants, or by name.
The defendants are real estate operators who, in the year 1966, were engaged in promoting a shopping area in Wyandotte County. In furtherance of this design they entered into a contract on May 2, 1966, with the Alta Investment Co. Inc., hereafter called Alta, for the purchase of a 33 acre tract of land at a price of $370,000, payable as follows: $7,000 on the signing of the contract, $8,000 on or before May 9, 1966, $12,775 on or before June 15, 1966, and the balance of $342,225 at the time of closing, which should be no later than August 1, 1966. We may conclude from the record that at this time the defendants were dickering with K-Mart for a lease of a portion of the proposed shopping center and were hoping to close the K-Mart deal prior to August 1, 1966.
Meyers and Reust made the $7,000 down payment but apparently needed financial assistance with respect to subsequent payments, and they turned to Thompson, a Topeka capitalist, for help. On May 9, 1966, the date on which the second payment was due Alta, the defendants signed an agreement with Thompson which has given rise to this lawsuit. Omitting formal parts and the whereases, the contract provides:
Thompson delivered the $8,000 payment to the defendants on May 9, as was agreed upon, but he did not supply the additional $12,000 which was due on the Alta contract on or before June 15, 1966, it being his contention that this amount was never requested of him by the defendants. This is one of the points in dispute and we will refer to it later on.
The record reflects that during the first week of June, 1966, the defendants entered into negotiations with three Texans, Jack Coogan, Roland E. Walters and W. Floyd Clark, all of Houston, to whom we will collectively refer as the Coogan group. The negotiations culminated in the Coogan group making a loan of $12,775 to Meyers and Reust on June 14, and in Meyers and Reust granting the Coogan group an option to purchase their interest in the Alta contract for the sum of $132,775 less the amount of the loan. This transaction is evidenced by a letter from Meyers and Reust to Roland Walters, Trustee, dated June 14, 1966. On July 21, 1966, the option was extended and modified in certain particulars which are of little or no consequence here.
A letter finalizing the details regarding the Coogan group's option was sent by Meyers to Walters under date of September 15, 1966. Pertinent portions of this document will be examined in more detail hereafter.
*29 A warranty deed was duly executed by Alta Investment Co., Inc. on September 19, 1966, conveying the Wyandotte tract to Jack Coogan and Roland E. Walters.
On June 12, 1969, Thompson filed the present lawsuit alleging that under the terms of his contract with Meyers and Reust they became indebted to him in the sum of $38,000; that $15,000 of that amount had been paid; and that $23,000 was still owed him. The action was tried to the court and Thompson was awarded judgment for the full amount of $23,000.
The major thrust of the defendants' arguments on appeal may be divided into four separate parts.
Their first contention is that neither they nor their nominee purchased the shopping center property from Alta, and hence their obligation to Thompson was simply to pay him what the contract provided in case Meyers and Reust decided not to buy the property, namely, one-half of what Thompson had put up, or $4,000. The defendants argue that Coogan and Walters were not nominees of Meyers and Reust within the meaning of their contract with Thompson but were their assignees, and that Coogan and Walters purchased the Wyandotte property from Alta after Meyers and Reust had assigned to them their interest in the Alta contract.
The trial court rejected this contention and held as a matter of law that Coogan and Walters were the nominees of Meyers and Reust in their purchase of the real estate from Alta. The court reasoned that in order for a nominee of Meyers and Reust to purchase the property from Alta, Meyers and Reust would be required to assign their interest in the contract to their nominee, and that this was within the contemplation of the parties who were signatories both to the Alta and to the Thompson contracts.
We agree with the trial court's conclusion on this point. The sense in which the term "nominee" is used in the two contracts is to be ascertained from the intention of the parties as it may be expressed in the instruments as a whole. (See cases in 2 Hatcher's Kansas Digest [Rev. Ed.] Contracts, §§ 39, 42.)
The first paragraph of the contract between Alta and Meyers and Reust reads:
*30 Thus the defendants' nominee is tied to the contract as a buyer, a buyer designated by Meyers and Reust should they decide not to purchase the property in their own right. We believe it clear that the parties to the Alta contract had in mind that Meyers and Reust could buy the property, themselves, or they could select someone else to do so, and this party they described as a nominee.
It seems equally clear that both Thompson and the defendants contemplated that the nominee selected by defendants could "purchase" the real estate and "obtain title" thereto, for these terms occur with some frequency in the Thompson contract. Moreover, the contract concludes with a proviso that it is binding upon and inures to the benefit of all the parties, their heirs, successors and assigns.
In common parlance the word "nominee" has more than one meaning. Much depends on the frame of reference in which it is used. In Webster's Third New International Dictionary, unabridged, one of the definitions given is "a person named as the recipient in an annuity or grant." We view a "nominee", as the term was used by the parties here, not simply in the sense of a straw man or limited agent for Meyers and Reust, but in the larger sense of a person designated by them to purchase the real estate, who would possess all the rights given a buyer in the Alta contract.
In the eyes of the law we believe the purchase by Coogan and Walters was in practical effect a purchase by Meyers and Reust, themselves, who reaped a profit from the transaction to the tune of $93,000. In the letter of September 15, 1966, to Walters finalizing the details of the deal, Meyers wrote in pertinent part:
It appears that the defendants were in full control of the closing procedure with Alta and the designation of the grantee.
In Schuh Trading Co. v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue, 95 *31 F.2d 404, 411, the federal court, in discussing the significance of the word "nominee", said:
For this court to hold that the defendants could evade their responsibility to Thompson under their contract, on the pretext that Coogan and Walters were not their nominees, would be to engage in sophistry and open the door to sharp dealing. Such is not the purpose, or the role, of the law.
It is next argued that Thompson breached his agreement to supply the $12,000 needed to make the June 15th payment due on the Alta contract. There is a good deal of testimony as to what transpired the early part of June 1966, not only between the defendants and Thompson but also between the defendants and the Coogan group. Meyers and Reust contend they were unable to contact Thompson during the first few days in June and were compelled to protect their interests by concluding an agreement with the Coogan group on June 6, 1966, under which the Coogan group agreed to, and did, supply the money needed to meet the June 15th payment. Thompson's testimony, as might be expected, was quite the contrary so far as his availability and readiness to put up the $12,000 was concerned.
No good purpose would be served by summarizing the lengthy and conflicting testimony introduced on this point at the trial. The trial court found that the defendants never made any request of Thompson for payment of $12,000; that during one conversation Meyers told Thompson it did not look as if it would be necessary for him to advance any more money; that Thompson, nonetheless, borrowed $12,000 from the bank to meet the June 15th payment to Alta if the same were needed; that Thompson was in Topeka from June 1 until June 6, but was not contacted by the defendants; and that he left word where he could be reached, if necessary, while on a projected fishing excursion. The trial court concluded that Thompson had not broken his agreement with Meyers and Reust.
On this branch of the appeal, we need only say that the findings of the trial court are adequately supported by substantial competent evidence. Thus our trusty time honored rule must be given effect. This court, on appeal, does not weigh conflicting evidence and will not disturb findings of the trial court which are shown to be sustained *32 by substantial competent evidence. (See cases cited in 1 Hatcher's Kansas Digest [Rev. Ed.] Appeal & Error, §§ 507, 508.)
As another defense to Thompson's claim the defendants have pleaded an accord and satisfaction. They maintain that an agreement was reached between Thompson and themselves in which Thompson was to receive $20,000 in full settlement of the amount due under his contract, and that $15,000 of this amount had already been paid, while the other $5,000 was due on demand  but that no demand had ever been made. The plaintiff, of course, takes an opposite view, while conceding that he had received $15,000.
Accord and satisfaction is an affirmative defense and, as such, it must be pleaded. (K.S.A. 60-208 [c].) To be effective both the accord, and the satisfaction, must be established. (Block v. Bodam, 128 Kan. 354, 278 Pac. 19; Manning v. Woods, Inc., 182 Kan. 640, 643, 324 P.2d 136.) A general definition of the terms is found in Lighthouse for the Blind v. Miller, 149 Kan. 165, 86 P.2d 508:
A series of dialogues undoubtedly took place between Thompson and the defendants concerning what Thompson was due, and the amount for which Thompson would settle his claim. This jockeying started on the evening of June 6, 1966, when, seemingly by pure chance, Thompson and his wife ran into  or were run into by  Meyers and Reust who were celebrating, with members of the Coogan group, their newly completed agreement for Coogan to furnish the $12,000. The encounter took place in the Cloud Room of the Kansas City Hilton, where Thompson was asked for the first time what he would take to settle. Thompson replied, in effect, this was neither the time nor the place for such mundane chatter. Periodically thereafter conversations were had between Thompson and the defendants, various sums were talked about, and various methods of payment were discussed.
The trial court found:
Our review of the evidence in its entirety leads us to conclude that this finding must be sustained. Although the parties came close to concluding a settlement on the basis of $20,000, there is evidence from which it can be inferred they could not agree on how, or when, or in what manner the final $5,000 was to be paid.
Finally, the defendants contend in their brief that on the basis of the plaintiff's own theory this action was brought prematurely. The record shows that Thompson filed his petition June 12, 1969. The defendants point out that Alta's deed to Coogan and Walters was executed September 19, 1966, and that payment to Thompson would not become due under the terms of his contract, until three years thereafter, that is, until September 19, 1969.
This point, the plaintiff contends, was not raised in the trial court, and plaintiff would have us invoke the familiar rule that matters not presented to the trial court will not be considered for the first time on appeal. (Evangelist v. Bellern Research Corporation, 199 Kan. 638, 433 P.2d 380; In re Bowlus, 197 Kan. 351, 416 P.2d 711.)
There is nothing in the record to indicate that this defense was ever raised in the defendants' pleadings. Neither is mention made thereof in the findings or conclusions of the court, or in the judgment which was entered. Accordingly, it would seem the point is not before us for review.
There is a further basis, however, for rejecting the defendants' argument on this issue. On December 9, 1969, Thompson filed what he entitled his First Amended Petition. The date of this filing, it will be noted, is some two months after Thompson's claim matured. In Hospital Co. v. Philippi, 82 Kan. 64, 107 Pac. 530, this court considered the question of premature filing and said:
An analogous principle is stated in 1 C.J.S., Actions, § 127a, p. 1395:
The defendants cites language from 1 Am.Jur.2d, Actions, § 87, to *34 the general effect that a cause of action must exist and be complete before an action can be commenced, and where a proceeding has been started before the cause of action stated in the pleadings has arisen, it will usually be dismissed when proper objection is raised. In the case at hand no objection appears to have been interposed before the district court. Moreover, the rule is tempered by what is said in § 90 of the same text:
We find no error in the judgment entered in the trial court and the same is affirmed.
PRAGER, J., not participating.