commission within the city of canton and madison county mississippi this relationship ended when a majority of the commission three of the five men members voted to alst warnock for what we could do under his reasons  and for alerting other public officials in camp and including other cmu commissioners about andersen's corrupt behavior as the record reflects that alert was simply a text messages dated during which mating warnock was ousted by a vote of three of the five members it should be emphasized that to the members voted against it the three of em voting for included anderson action through a majority of its members represented by the three commissioners i just mention is allowable under section nine thousand nine hundred and eighty three and mondale for retaliating against warnock in violation of the st men court essential he ruled that warnock had failed to present quote unquote direct evidence that anderson's retaliatory animists was shared by the other two commissioners williams  the specific deposition testimony and evidence that supports that claim is on page fifteen of our brave where an excerpt from anderson's testimony is set out where i asked him in his deposition is it true that you made a motion to terminate mr ward contracts because he would not go along with the scheme to add two hundred thousand dollars to a project for your benefit and the answer he gave was i don't recall followed up with a question well you would recall whether or not that's true or not when you the answer he gave i don't recall that's a record of fi when he was asked it is a deposition whether he had talked to the other two commissioners who voted with him about a planned to terminate war just a few days later during  well there was the alternative funding that the district court made which was that and i believe what you're alluding to is the concept that it would have made the same decision anyway but for retaliatory air was right meetings that he had no obvious right to have and he admitted that he was interfering with the employment some people in the utilities division emitted that he was insubordinate done these things hear knowledge that there was disagreements within c of you about his role however whether those issues amounted to grounds to terminate him are fact issues in the reason i say that is there is nothing in the minutes you know the minutes issue looms throughout this case nothing in the minutes suggest any issue or problem before the special called meeting concerning were not overstepping his bounds or being outside his lane or in any way acting improperly whether there was any issue with his services rendered or the amounts of his invoices nothing appears in the minutes well how much did he been paid at this point in time by the sitting up to the point of terminations yes or i don't know the exact dollar amount but he  sewer which was a flat fee contra ok that was flat the what was is ordinary hourly billing rate the city would have been paying don't recall it's in the contract or are i think it was one hundred and journalist at this point well that's certainly within the context of the the young lawful behavior that in the corrupt behavior that anderson was engaged in activity of your client when what he's talking about is very serious potential crimes or attempts or solicitations and he never went to prosecuting authorities well he did go to a law enforcement it collocated oh who was working off the books for him as some kind of security advisor who apparently just jones thank your honor now just to say the two issues that the district court ruled on was whether anderson's retaliatory enemas could be attributed to attributed to the other board members we submit there's a that's a fact issue because of the timing as well as the deposition testimony that mr williams and mr sawyer gave that they had no idea no personal knowledge while they were terminated they had no issue or problem prior that special call me they had no personal any issue with mr warnock's performance so it begs the question is for the jury to decide why did they vote to fart and they were the three members of the majority and instead and whether they used the reasons that were cited none of the three witnesses could tell me where they came up with these reasons that were resigned it into the record during the special pollinating which was like eight or so very happened or that they were going anyway on toward your honor he admitted fact he did not admit that the adverse characterization well let me give you an example you mentioned the involvement and or the all from those facts and circumstances once they hear the testimony of the witnesses about but you don't but but all you what you have is his test self serving testimony that he was invited to sit on the of it with ours are you not really urging that today well no i mean we could to and i mean i think to answer that question joe is i need to give some background about how this issue arose which was this year before that is she was st raised in their summary judgment motion as are grounds to do not any and all claim that in response to the summary judgment motion we pointed out that while technically accurate upon review of the matter having been st raised a year into the litigation that the contracts it issued a three contracts were spread of the court addressed that claim somewhat and it's for summary judgment opinion and because it was suggested in the opinion of the court didn't feel like we had either player or had a right to paly that claim we within thirty days of that ruling saw it leave said two things we said we believe that we've adequately pled this under federal or that it had been adequately play out under federal pleading standard well you know if your client had been properly advised from the beginning and by the beginning i mean when he ended this contract with mr wiens who commit who according to the city's brief committed suicide and is now deceased i had he been properly advised by counsel they would have asked if they would have made certain that the contract was spread upon the minutes also since he was a public contractor best case for saying this very obvious problem in your client's case which was not sought to be corrected until years into  litigation amounts to an abuse of discretion when the district court says i've had enough of this because of course the court a gone through how many causes of action already that you and the you  your client and pleaded in them withdrawn six or seven other different causes of action and finally back into a corner he said oh well it's really  minute on that point your honor we submitted an affidavit from so you've used former attorney mark s testified that he personally instructed the city clerk to record those contracts in the minutes in the record evidence is undisputed litigation when it was st raised by seeing you in its motion for summary judgment we've been sought reconsideration for the court to allow us to pursue this claim it's important to note that when the court issued extended the discovery period by several months it extended the trial date until october of nineteen there was ample discovery there was no discovery that needed to be done because in the issue here is fair notice the question is did see if you have a fair notice that an issue about quantum where it was in the case did have a fair notice that there was an issue about the reasonable value of the services were in the case well the answer to that has to be of course because long before this came up they had designated two witnesses to professionals an accountant in an engineer who prepared fifty page expert reports contesting picking the value of warnock's services how anybody could cut a contract didn't exist at this point and the value of the services is measured by reasonableness not by the contract and you're saying you're disputing them because they are taking it position you're taking you continue to rely on the contract and the value of the services so up why argue more that arguably your position and probable would have to change no your honor the contracts are certainly evidence of the reasonable value of the services rendered now it's not necessarily dispositive in the jury can come to a different conclusion as to what the reasonable value but we started cases in our brief where the courts have said that it although the contract ma fail for some legal reasons such as in this case the minutes requirement the value that the parties agreed upon can certainly be admitted as relevant evidence for the reasonable value on a quantum erowid client the best plaintiff says the factual predicate for the company that is sufficient with that may be sufficient when the plaintiff's lawyers filed a claim but you're talking about three years brings into focus our rights alternatively which you would need to paly well and that if that was a foreseeable alternative situation i know you say was that mr p and told the clerk to do such and such when your client was praised investigating is cause of action that knowledge about being spread on the minutes is very plain in mississippi law i didn't believe it existed all i had and i sat on another case within the last year or two but that's practically a condition precedent to a public contractor making a lawsuit against a public body in mississippi contracts and to be spread on the minutes and again had your client been appropriately represented he should have looked into that immediately seems to me well all i can say is that he and the  wide open there was no trial date all that would be required is to add the statute in the words on the air with which again we submit is not even required under federal pleadings but out of an abundance of caution we asked the district  for leave to allow us to do that now at discovery been closed or trial date imminent this may be a due chase but under the circumstances and again the court weighed it ok i'm not being rude and you've got they allegation concerning the cap right cap right playing was dependent on having a private quite the plaintiff in a case which was not in the middle of the argument on the most most no one including the plaintiffs ever considered this a quantum merit claim the engineering that's going on now by claiming that somehow our response and pleadings and the fact that we ha was some conspiracy to get rid of missed one i bought a boat now speaking about the boat as a whole not just mr anderson there's absolutely no proof of that the court i think articulated  argument i suppose in councils as these these reasons there's no they seem to all be in lockstep and and announced at this meeting on the phone and that there wasn't i history or trace you know tracing back to where these came from it could have been from mr anderson and why doesn't that create a fact issue and also why doesn't the why don't the checks and whether or off submitted to the utilities company on january thirty one of two thousand and seventeen so it's right after he was fired and was saying here's how much money you owe me and it lists many different items you know and says they build a mill build amount they paid amount paid and then a standing balance which he totals up to over six million  was there anything in the record as during discovery to underline underlie these invoices in other words where their time sheet was material that missed one i had gotten from cmu itself and also materials that he got from his previous employer well what i'm getting at i suppose is that had the court allowed  a th amended complaint to be on all asserting quanah merit the city would have had to start discovery all over again to assess reasonable amount of services and how to get that in and i did have a lot of really  itself and obviously it was mr want to have action that that make the contrast illegal that's according to mississippi mississippi it off the statute that he's traveling on the only then what what happens because we had to have some case law in our circuit that says that just stating the content of the claim without labels is adequate and so just assume for a minute that we wouldn't say it was then what happens well merit claim and the district court was wrong in saying that it needed to be amended to make it you know and it wasn't pleaded then do we have to back that's i guess that's basically my question is there any other way to resolve the case without sending december nd two thousand and sixteen which was the same day of the special call meeting at sea and year there was a meeting of the mayor of board of aldermen intend to call a special meeting to remove cleveland henderson as a commissioner and stop him or at least attempt to stop you know from exerting control over the city and you board that's it record father to not the alderman at that meeting and this is also in the record unanimously adopted a resolution stating that exit circumstances existed to remove anderson per call but then the mayor for whatever reason vetoed that resolution so it's entirely a fact question as to whether action was taken in response to the exit circumstances that arose by virtue of the text message that went from mr warnock to canton public officials cited mr blackman mentioned some issue with a computer that of course was not among the issues no nor mentioned anywhere in the minutes so it's absolutely irrelevant mr black and mentioned warnock's invoices and deliverables and so forth and that's just simply not true the experts that they hired had already performed that work in their expert course that were done and submitted and briefed on dogbert motions with the court before ruling upon all that work was done i don't know what possibly they could do more and it's simply for the jury again to  somehow disqualified as a vendor under the good play vendor statute because i think he said warnock told the illegality and therefore can't be considered innocent vendor that is simply a fact issue based on the fact that c of c in use on a party was involved in and instructed the city of city clerk to record the contracts on the minutes now why i think he's talking about