Title: Hansen v. Sheridan County School Dist. No. 2

State: wyoming

Issuer: Wyoming Supreme Court

Document:

Hansen v. Sheridan County School Dist. No. 21993 WY 29847 P.2d 1026Case Number: 92-180Decided: 03/02/1993Supreme Court of Wyoming
Jack 
HANSEN, Appellant (Defendant),

v.

SHERIDAN 
COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT # 2, Appellee (Plaintiff).

Appeal 
from District Court, Sheridan County, James N. Wolfe, 
J.

Nicholas 
Vassallo and Harold F. Buck of Buck Law Offices, Cheyenne, for 
appellant.

Fred 
R. Dollison of Shoumaker & Dollison, Sheridan, for 
appellee.

Before 
MACY, C.J., and THOMAS, CARDINE, GOLDEN, and TAYLOR, 
JJ.

MACY, 
Chief Justice.

[¶1]      Appellant Jack 
Hansen appeals from the district court's order granting a summary judgment in 
favor of Appellee Sheridan County School District # 2 on its claim that Mr. 
Hansen was not entitled to receive any preference in being rehired under the 
School District's reduction-in-force (RIF) policy.

[¶2]      We 
affirm.

[¶3]      Mr. Hansen 
presents a single issue for our review:

  Does Jack Hansen's recovery against the 
School District, for failure to properly follow its   RIF policy when it terminated him, 
foreclose him from later pursuing a claim against the School District for the 
breach of its separate contractual obligation to re-hire Mr. Hansen upon the 
occurrence of specified conditions?

[¶4]      The School 
District employed Mr. Hansen as a welding teacher from 1974 until the spring of 
1988. His employment contract with the School District included a RIF policy. 
That policy allowed the School District to reduce the number of teachers when it 
became necessary due to reduced enrollment or other events beyond the school 
board's control. Under the RIF policy, nonrenewal of teachers' contracts was to 
be accomplished on the basis of seniority with some minor exceptions which are 
not applicable in this case. Those teachers whose contracts were not renewed 
under the RIF policy were entitled to "be recalled in order of nonrenewal as 
positions they are qualified for become available for a period of 5 
years."

[¶5]      In April 1988, 
Mr. Hansen received a letter from the School District notifying him that, due to 
a lack of enrollment and reduced funding, his contract was not being renewed 
under the RIF policy. Mr. Hansen responded by filing suit against the School 
District in federal district court for, among other things, a breach of 
contract. He claimed that the School District violated its RIF policy by 
renewing the contracts of other teachers who had less seniority than he had. He 
sought to recover damages for his lost wages and fringe benefits, both past and 
future. A jury agreed with Mr. Hansen and awarded $90,000 to him for the School 
District's breach of contract.

[¶6]      Following the 
breach-of-contract verdict in federal district court, the School District 
brought a declaratory judgment action against Mr. Hansen in state district court 
to determine whether the RIF policy still obligated it to give a preference to 
Mr. Hansen when it was rehiring. The School District's position was that, since 
Mr. Hansen had already recovered damages for all potential future employment 
with the School District, he was no longer entitled to receive preferential 
treatment under the RIF policy's rehire provisions. Mr. Hansen filed several 
counterclaims, including breach of contract for failure to rehire, promissory 
estoppel, and retaliatory failure to rehire. He moved for a summary judgment on 
his breach-of-contract claim, and the School District moved for a summary 
judgment on its declaratory judgment action. Following a hearing on the 
respective motions, the district court entered a summary judgment for the School 
District and against Mr. Hansen on his counterclaims. Mr. Hansen has appealed 
from only the district court's grant of a summary judgment to the School 
District.

[¶7]      We have repeated 
our standard of review for summary judgments innumerable times and do not need 
to reiterate it here. Powder River Oil Company v. Powder River Petroleum 
Corporation, 830 P.2d 403, 406-07 (Wyo. 1992).

[¶8]      The summary 
judgment order contained two conclusions which explain why the lower court 
ascertained that Mr. Hansen was precluded from bringing an action to enforce the 
rehire provisions:

A. 
The verdict and judgment in [the federal suit], for past and future wages, 
resulted in Hansen being paid for all future years he might have worked for the 
School District.

B. 
The "employment contract" represented by the RIF policy was terminated by the 
verdict and judgment in [the federal suit], insofar as the District's obligation 
to re-hire Hansen is concerned.

Mr. 
Hansen views the court's reasoning as being ambiguous, but he concludes that the 
court relied on the doctrines of res judicata and/or impermissible claim 
splitting to reach its decision. He contends that the doctrine of res judicata 
should not bar him from bringing a subsequent claim for breach of the rehire 
provisions because the School District had not yet violated those provisions 
when he brought his initial suit.

[¶9]      Mr. Hansen may be 
correct that the doctrine of res judicata does not bar him from bringing a claim 
for breach of the rehire provisions. However, we understand the district court's 
rationale for granting a summary judgment to be grounded in the simple 
prohibition against a double recovery of damages rather than on the intricate 
complexities of the doctrine of res judicata. The lower court's reasoning is 
appropriate under the facts of this case. When Mr. Hansen brought his federal 
suit against the School District for failing to renew his contract, he sought 
both past and future damages. The jury was instructed:

If 
you find that plaintiff is entitled to a verdict, the amount of damages to be 
awarded to the plaintiff for future lost wages and fringe benefits must be based 
upon the period of time that you determine would be a "reasonable time" for 
plaintiff's employment with Sheridan County School District No. 2 to continue, 
considering the facts and circumstances of this case.

The 
jury returned a verdict in favor of Mr. Hansen for $90,000. When Mr. Hansen was 
released by the School District, he was earning $30,000 per year and, at the 
time of the verdict, he had been unemployed for two years. Presumably, the 
jury's verdict awarded $60,000 for past wages and benefits and $30,000 to 
compensate for the time during which the jury thought Mr. Hansen would have been 
employed by the School District in the future.

[¶10]   If Mr. Hansen had the ability to 
subsequently sue for a breach of the rehire provision after already recovering 
damages for loss of future employment, he would be placed in the enviable 
position of possibly recovering twice from the School District for future 
employment: once in the federal suit when he recovered wages and benefits for 
all the future years he might have worked for the School District, and a second 
time if he recovered for not being given preference under the RIF policy's 
rehire provisions. Such a scenario is incompatible with the fundamental 
principle that, when assessing damages, an injured party is entitled to be 
compensated for his loss and no more. UNC Teton Exploration Drilling, Inc. v. 
Peyton, 774 P.2d 584, 592 (Wyo. 1989). See also Western National Bank of Casper 
v. Harrison, 577 P.2d 635 (Wyo. 1978) (double recoveries are not 
favored).

[¶11]   Mr. Hansen responds to the 
double-recovery claim by arguing that the School District failed to establish 
that he was fully compensated for potential claims under the RIF policy's rehire 
provisions. He points out that the jury's future damage award was relatively 
small. One explanation for the small measure of future damages is that the jury 
reduced his future damages under the impression that he would be quickly rehired 
pursuant to the rehire provisions. To bolster this explanation, Mr. Hansen 
claims that witnesses in the federal trial testified that the rehire provisions 
would remain in force after the trial (although there is no transcript of the 
trial, and he is unsure who the witnesses were or what they 
said).

[¶12]   The gist of Mr. Hansen's argument 
appears to be that, if the jury failed to fully compensate him in the federal 
suit for future wages, then a successful action under the rehire provision would 
not constitute a double recovery. The difficulty with this argument is that the 
court instructed the jury that, if Mr. Hansen is entitled to a verdict, he 
should be awarded future wages and benefits for the reasonable length of time 
the jury thought his employment with the School District would have continued. 
We must presume that the jury faithfully followed the court's instruction and 
awarded damages for the projected length of time. Goggins v. Harwood, 704 P.2d 1282, 1295 n. 17 (Wyo. 1985). It would be inappropriate for this Court to 
blindly speculate that the jury reduced Mr. Hansen's award because it presumed 
that he might be rehired. The award could reflect an endless number of equally 
plausible explanations; e.g., the jury concluded that Mr. Hansen's award should 
be reduced because he could obtain other gainful 
employment.

[¶13]   Affirmed.