Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-04-07044/USCOURTS-caDC-04-07044-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Robert Winthrop Johnson II
Appellee
The Government of Rwanda
Appellant

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued March 14, 2005 Decided May 27, 2005

Nos. 04-7044 & 04-7067

THE GOVERNMENT OF RWANDA,

APPELLEE/CROSS-APPELLANT

v.

ROBERT WINTHROP JOHNSON II,

APPELLANT/CROSS-APPELLEE

Appeals from the United States District Court

(USDC) for the District of Columbia

(No. 97cv01550)

James R. Atwood argued the cause for appellant/crossappellee Robert Winthrop Johnson II. With him on the briefs

was Heidi C. Doerhoff.

David J. Farber argued the cause and filed the briefs for

appellee/cross-appellant The Government of Rwanda.

Before: EDWARDS, TATEL, and GARLAND, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge TATEL.

TATEL, Circuit Judge: As Rwanda’s bloody civil war drew

to a close, with rebel forces controlling Rwanda’s capital and the

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retreating government accused of genocide, the embattled

regime retained appellant, a Washington lawyer, to help

improve its image and cast the rebels as terrorists. Roughly a

week later, after the United States ordered Rwanda’s embassy

closed, appellant entered a second agreement, this time to

provide (among other things) immigration help to Rwanda’s

ambassador and other embassy diplomats, who feared reprisals

if they returned home. Pursuant to these agreements, Rwanda

paid some $80,000 into appellant’s client trust account, and after

the war a new government formed by the victorious rebels sued

to get the money back. Following a bench trial, the district court

found appellant liable for conversion and breach of fiduciary

duty, explaining that appellant had performed virtually no work

under the first contract and treated the second as a personal

account with Rwanda’s former ambassador rather than an

agreement with Rwanda itself. The court also awarded $10,000

in punitive damages. For the most part, we affirm.

I.

Some of the late twentieth century’s most horrific events

form the background of this litigation. On April 6, 1994, a

surface-to-air missile from an as-yet unidentified source shot

down an aircraft carrying Rwanda’s president, Juvenal

Habyarimana. Stepping into the power vacuum, extremists from

Rwanda’s majority Hutu ethnic group formed an interim

government and unleashed genocidal violence that over the next

100 days claimed the lives of some 800,000 Rwandans, most of

them ethnic Tutsis, a minority group historically dominant in

Rwandan politics. As ill-equipped United Nations peacekeepers

stood by, powerless to contain the bloodshed, a Tutsi rebel force

called the Rwandan Patriotic Front (“RPF”) canceled a 1993

ceasefire and resumed its offensive against the government.

While civil war and genocide raged, Rwanda’s embassy in

Washington entered into the two agreements at issue in this

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case. First, on July 8, 1994, four days after RPF forces captured

Rwanda’s capital Kigali, Rwanda’s United States Ambassador

Aloys Uwimana, a representative of the Hutu government,

signed a “Memorandum of Understanding” with three

Americans—appellant Robert W. Johnson II; Timothy Towell,

a retired U.S. diplomat; and Edward van Kloberg III, a

Washington lobbyist. Under this agreement, the three

Americans, termed the “Rwanda Working Group” or “RWG,”

were to “assist the Government of Rwanda, through Ambassador

Aloys Uwimana in Washington, to get its views clearly and

dramatically presented to the international community.” In

particular, the RWG would “[e]ncourage the comprehension and

support of American authorities of Rwanda’s cause,” aiming to

“isolat[e]” the RPF and foster the perception that it constituted

“a marginal group, perhaps even a minority, foreignmanipulated, terrorist group.” The MOU, which called for

payments totaling $70,000, required an initial deposit of

$28,000. On July 13, Rwanda’s embassy cut a check for that

amount to the “Robert W. Johnson II Trust Fund.”

But it was soon too late for lobbying. On July 15—just one

week after Rwanda signed the MOU and two days after

Rwanda’s $28,000 payment—the United States issued a “Note

Verbale” requiring, given “the uncertain and untenable situation

which has existed in Rwanda since April 6, 1994,” that the

embassy terminate all “operations of the diplomatic mission,

other than activities relating to the closure of the mission,

effective July 22, 1994.” Though one embassy official,

Boniface Karani, was “permitted to remain in the United States

for the present to oversee the closing of the Embassy,” the note

ordered Ambassador Uwimana to leave the country “no later

than July 22, 1994.” “All remaining members of the mission

and their family members (other than any who may be citizens

or legal permanent residents of the United States), including

Mrs. Uwimana and children,” were to “depart the United States

no later than August 14, 1994.”

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The Note Verbale precipitated Johnson’s second agreement

with Rwanda. In a letter to Ambassador Uwimana, Johnson

offered to help with the embassy’s closure, providing in

particular “continued oversight and assistance” regarding

immigration requests by embassy employees hoping to remain

in the United States instead of returning to the chaos in Rwanda.

Johnson proposed:

[W]e will work with the State Department to ensure that

their recommendations to the Immigration and

Naturalization Service are favorable, and we will obtain

testimony from experts that conditions in Rwanda are

presently life-threatening. Also, we shall supervise and

coordinate the activities of [two immigration attorneys] in

the preparation of the asylum requests and the handling of

the cases to ensure that the work is thorough and costeffective.

Claiming that “[a]ll the $28,000.00 [paid under the MOU] has

been disbursed or obligated,” Johnson’s letter requested $55,000

for the new work—$30,000 for the immigration attorneys and

$25,000 for the RWG. On July 22, the day the embassy closed,

Ambassador Uwimana signed Johnson’s proposal and

authorized a check for $55,000, again payable to Johnson’s

client trust fund.

The following month, Johnson learned that the United

States had recognized the RPF as Rwanda’s legitimate

government. Soon afterwards, Karani, by then newly

reappointed to the embassy, wrote “to confirm the termination”

of the July 22 agreement and demand return of $17,475, the

amount Karani calculated to be left in the account. Apparently

referring to immigration work performed on Uwimana’s behalf,

Karani observed that “necessary steps have been taken for only

one diplomat family,” making Johnson’s retention of the full

$55,000 unnecessary. Nonetheless, Johnson refused to make

any refund, insisting in two response letters that only Uwimana

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could direct his expenditures. Two months later, another

embassy official demanded return of the entire $55,000. Again,

Johnson refused.

Having thus failed to obtain a voluntary refund, Rwanda

sued in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia,

asserting D.C. law claims of conversion and breach of fiduciary

duty against Johnson, Uwimana, and Johnson’s two RWG

colleagues. Uwimana declared bankruptcy, obtaining an

automatic stay under 11 U.S.C. § 362, and Johnson’s two

partners settled, paying Rwanda $26,200 out of the $28,000 paid

under the MOU. After denying Johnson’s motion to dismiss and

Rwanda’s motion for summary judgment, see Gov’t of Rwanda

v. Rwanda Working Group, 150 F. Supp. 2d 1 (D.D.C. 2001),

the district court held a two-day bench trial. Based on extensive

factual findings, the district court concluded that “none of the

lobbying or other work for Rwanda ever took place under the

July 8 MOU” and that Johnson “used $55,000 from the July 22

Letter Agreement almost exclusively for Mr. Uwimana’s asylum

request and for other immigration services,” undertakings the

district judge believed were “against the interest of [Johnson’s]

client, the Government of Rwanda.” See Gov’t of Rwanda v.

Rwanda Working Group, 227 F. Supp. 2d 45, 63 (D.D.C. 2002)

(“RWG”).

The district court held Johnson liable for conversion and

fiduciary breach as to both the MOU and the July 22 agreement,

imposing liability in the amount of $56,800—$1,800 as the

balance from the MOU payment following the two RWG

members’ settlement, plus $55,000 based on the July 22

agreement. Id. at 72-73. In addition, finding that Johnson’s

“actions in this case were accompanied by gross recklessness

and a willful disregard of the rights of his rightful client—the

Government of Rwanda,” the district court imposed $10,000 in

punitive damages. Id. at 72. Finally, the court referred claims

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for prejudgment interest and attorney’s fees to a magistrate

judge, id. at 73, who awarded interest but not fees.

Johnson now appeals the district court’s judgment in

Rwanda’s favor on the conversion and fiduciary breach counts

as well as its award of punitive damages. Rwanda cross-appeals

the denial of fees and calculation of prejudgment interest.

II.

We begin with Johnson’s challenges to the conversion and

fiduciary breach claims, reviewing the district court’s factual

findings for clear error and its legal conclusions de novo, see,

e.g., Singletary v. District of Columbia, 351 F.3d 519, 523 (D.C.

Cir. 2003); see also Fed. R. Civ. P. 52(a) (indicating that

following trial without a jury, “[f]indings of fact, whether based

on oral or documentary evidence, shall not be set aside unless

clearly erroneous, and due regard shall be given to the

opportunity of the trial court to judge of the credibility of the

witnesses”). In addition to disputing the legal sufficiency of the

district court’s findings, Johnson argues that notwithstanding

Rwanda’s later demand for the full $55,000, Karani’s earlier

letter ratified all but $17,475 of his expenditures pursuant to the

July 22 agreement—a proposition Johnson says is conclusively

established by In re Uwimana, 274 F.3d 806 (4th Cir. 2001), a

Fourth Circuit case involving former Ambassador Uwimana’s

personal bankruptcy. Because we agree with the district court

that Johnson breached his fiduciary duties with respect to both

agreements, we will affirm the district court’s judgment without

considering the conversion claims. But because we agree with

Johnson that the Fourth Circuit’s decision has preclusive effect,

we will reduce the amount of Rwanda’s recovery.

The MOU

Starting with the $1,800 left over from Rwanda’s MOU

payment, we have little trouble upholding Johnson’s liability.

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Though the record indicates that Johnson disbursed Rwanda’s

entire $28,000 payment, himself pocketing a $3,000 fee plus $41

in expenses, the district court found that neither he nor anyone

else performed any of the lobbying services called for in the

MOU, see RWG, 227 F. Supp. 2d at 54. Indeed, according to

district court findings unchallenged by Johnson, “the only work

Mr. Johnson performed pursuant to the July 8 MOU was to

administer the contract, disburse the $28,000, and make sure that

the checks disbursing the $28,000 would not bounce.” Id. at 55.

Yet Johnson told his client otherwise, stating in the proposal that

became the July 22 agreement that “[a]ll of the $28,000 has been

disbursed or obligated for work performed thus far on various

projects” and that Johnson’s two colleagues had “maintained

continuous liaison with State Department officials to provide

accurate information and to persuade the State Department to

modify the White House’s hard line with respect to the closure

of the embassy and the expulsion of the diplomatic

staff”—assertions the district court found to be “blatant

misrepresentations,” id.

As Rwanda’s agent under the MOU and as trustee of

Rwanda’s $28,000, Johnson owed a fiduciary duty to “deal in

the principal’s interest” and put Rwanda’s interests before his

own. Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, Inc. v. Cheng, 901

F.2d 1124, 1128 (D.C. Cir. 1990); see also Maxwell v.

Gallagher, 709 A.2d 100, 102 & n.4 (D.C. 1998) (affirming

liability for fiduciary breach where the lower court found in a

bench trial that defendants “placed their private interest . . .

above the interest of the . . . client”); Aronoff v. Lenkin Co., 618

A.2d 669, 687 (D.C. 1992) (noting that agents “owe[] a duty of

good faith and candor” to their principal). Johnson’s deception

of the Rwandan embassy regarding the RWG’s work breached

that obligation. So did Johnson’s disbursal of the entire

$28,000—including over $3,000 for himself—despite the

RWG’s failure to perform its side of the contract. We thus find

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no error in the $1,800 award, barely half the amount Johnson

pocketed and far less than he disbursed.

The July 22 Agreement

We also agree with the district court that Johnson breached

his fiduciary obligations with respect to the July 22 agreement,

though we depart somewhat from its reasoning. Relying on

what it called “the common-sense notion that it is not in a

government’s interest to have one of its ambassadors choose to

seek asylum in another country, whatever the merits of the

asylum request might be,” the district court held that Johnson’s

immigration assistance to embassy staff necessarily conflicted

with the interests of the state of Rwanda, Johnson’s client under

his two agreements with Rwanda’s embassy. See RWG, 227 F.

Supp. 2d at 63, 64-65. Insofar as the district court expressed a

categorical view about ambassadorial authority, we hesitate to

endorse its reasoning, for we think that in some circumstances

it may serve a war-torn state’s interests to allow key embassy

personnel to remain safely in the United States if their lives

would be threatened back home. Moreover, while the Note

Verbale’s one-week closure deadline certainly “underscored that

[the United States] would no longer recognize Mr. Uwimana as

Ambassador after July 22, 1994,” id. at 68, it also required quick

decisions regarding use of the embassy’s soon-to-beinaccessible funds. In this context, a reasonable attorney may

well have believed that Uwimana, even on his last day in office,

could expend state money to protect embassy staff.

The problem for Johnson is that Uwimana did more than

just protect his staff—he also spent Rwanda’s money on

himself. Whatever the scope of an ambassador’s authority to

order immigration services in general, such self-dealing

breached a critical obligation that Uwimana owed to Rwanda as

steward of its United States embassy, namely, “the age-old

principle applicable to fiduciary relationships that, unless there

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is a full disclosure by the agent, trustee, or attorney of his

activity and interest in the transaction to the party he represents

and the obtaining of the consent of the party represented, the

party serving in the fiduciary capacity cannot receive any profit

or emolument from the transaction.” McGinnis v. Rogers, 279

A.2d459,470(Md. 1971); cf. Urban Invs., Inc. v. Branham, 464

A.2d 93, 96 (D.C. 1983) (per curiam) (holding that agents must

obtain “full[] and free[]” consent to any dual representation).

Indeed, citing this rule, the Fourth Circuit concluded in

Uwimana’s bankruptcy case that Uwimana owed Rwanda a nondischargeable debt for “defalcation,” i.e., “failure to meet an

obligation,” because he “used at least some of the funds

belonging to the Republic of Rwanda to purchase a substantial

benefit—preparation of a case for asylum—for himself and his

family, without disclosing his act to the government of the state

he represented or seeking its consent.” See Uwimana, 274 F.3d

at 811, 812 (internal quotation marks omitted).

Given Uwimana’s conflict of interest, Johnson, an attorney

presumably familiar with agency principles, should have not

only questioned Uwimana’s authority, but also demanded

evidence that Rwanda consented to its ambassador’s apparent

looting of state coffers. To be sure, the chaos in Rwanda,

coupled with the Note Verbale’s short time-frame, may have

limited Johnson’s ability to verify Uwimana’s authority. But

Johnson could have at least made some effort. Instead,

according to district court findings—again, unchallenged

here—Johnson “never took any steps to determine the extent of

Mr. Uwimana’s authority.” RWG, 227 F. Supp. 2d at 68. It thus

makes no difference whether, as the parties debate, Johnson’s

client at the time was merely the interim government or the

Rwandan state as a whole (soon to be controlled by the RPF),

for Johnson sought clarification from neither. Indeed, Johnson

even failed to ask the State Department which government the

United States recognized. See id. at 58.

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The same problem carries through to Johnson’s

implementation of the July 22 contract. In addition to

immigration services, the agreement did call for “continued

support to Embassy personnel on governmental and personal

matters during the transition” as well as help managing embassy

bank accounts. But with respect to “services supposedly

involved in closing down the Embassy,” the district court found

that Johnson “spent less than half an hour” on certain

administrative tasks and “never completed or submitted a list of

Embassy debts to the Department of State, or took care of

Embassy vehicles, insurance policies, addresses, or leases,

among other things,” id. at 57, apparently because the State

Department told him such measures were unnecessary. What

Johnson did do was expend large sums on Uwimana’s

immigration requests—precisely the problematic aspect of the

July 22 agreement. Indeed, Johnson refused to change course

even when Rwanda’s new government, which by then Johnson

knew the United States recognized, demanded return of $17,475.

In short, although Johnson should have been circumspect

from the start about Uwimana’s authority, he instead took the

view, convenient for his own interest, that Uwimana could use

state money to buy himself tens of thousands of dollars in

immigration services. Johnson insisted, moreover, that

Uwimana retained that authority long after Uwimana ceased to

hold any official position—indeed, long after the government

Uwimana represented had ceased to control Rwanda. Thus

complicit in Uwimana’s self-dealing, Johnson again breached

his duty to “deal in the principal’s interest.” Merrill Lynch, 901

F.2d at 1128.

How much, then, does Johnson owe? Were the full $55,000

in play, we might need to decide whether Johnson’s breach

covered that entire sum or only a portion of it. But we think the

Fourth Circuit’s decision in former Ambassador Uwimana’s

personal bankruptcy case limits Rwanda to a far smaller amount.

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The Fourth Circuit held that by demanding only $17,475 in

Karani’s letter, Rwanda ratified expenditures beyond that

amount and thus could recover no greater sum in its defalcation

action. See Uwimana, 274 F.3d at 813. The doctrine of issue

preclusion bars parties from relitigating any issue “contested by

the parties and submitted for judicial determination in [a] prior

case,” so long as “the issue [was] actually and necessarily

determined by a court of competent jurisdiction in that prior

case” and “preclusion in the second case [would] not work a

basic unfairness to the party bound by the first determination.”

Yamaha Corp. of Am. v. United States, 961 F.2d 245, 254 (D.C.

Cir. 1992). Here, the district court, reasoning that the Fourth

Circuit’s decision involved a different claim (defalcation rather

than fiduciary breach or conversion) and a different defendant

(Uwimana rather than Johnson), denied preclusive effect to the

prior judgment against Rwanda. See RWG, 227 F. Supp. 2d at

68-69. We disagree.

As the Supreme Court made clear in Blonder-Tongue

Laboratories, Inc. v. University of Illinois Foundation, 402 U.S.

313 (1971), issue preclusion does not require mutuality of

parties. “In any lawsuit,” the Court explained, “where a

defendant, because of the mutuality principle, is forced to

present a complete defense on the merits to a claim which the

plaintiff has fully litigated and lost in a prior action, there is an

arguable misallocation of resources.” Id. at 329. According to

Johnson, any reconsideration of the effect of Karani’s letter

would entail just such a misallocation. In other words, he argues

that because Rwanda already litigated ratification and lost, it

shouldn’t get to do so again. Responding, Rwanda asserts that

this case involves no second bite at the apple because the theory

in In re Uwimana (the ambassador’s defalcation) differs from

the claim here (Johnson’s fiduciary breach). The defect in this

analysis is that the Fourth Circuit’s ratification holding, while

directly addressing only Uwimana’s liability, depended on a

refund request written to Johnson. See Uwimana, 274 F.3d at

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813. Had Rwanda demanded the funds directly from Uwimana,

its argument might have some force, for in that case Rwanda

could have intended to forgive Uwimana’s payment but not

necessarily Johnson’s use of the money. But Karani’s letter to

Johnson never even mentions Uwimana by name. It deals

entirely with Johnson’s expenditures, removing from the refund

tally “steps . . . taken for . . . one diplomat family,” i.e.,

Uwimana’s. To find ratification as to Uwimana, then, the

Fourth Circuit must also have found ratification as to Johnson.

Any other result would attribute to Rwanda an entirely illogical

intention, i.e., approving Uwimana’s authorization of the steps

in question but not Johnson’s performance of those very same

steps, even though Karani’s letter refers only to Johnson’s

performance.

The Fourth Circuit thus “actually and necessarily

determined” Rwanda’s ratification of Johnson’s expenditures.

See Yamaha, 961 F.2d at 254. In addition, we see no “basic

unfairness” in precluding relitigation, see id., for the prior

proceedings gave Rwanda every incentive to dispute the letter’s

significance vis-à-vis Johnson’s possession and use of state

funds. Indeed, because Uwimana’s ratification theory depended

on Karani’s letter, Rwanda could have prevailed in the Fourth

Circuit only by contesting Johnson’s liability. Where, as here,

“there is no prejudice to the plaintiff, no forfeiture of the res

judicata issue has yet occurred, the relevant facts stand

uncontroverted in the record before us, and denial would only

engender delay,” we ourselves may resolve a preclusion claim

without remanding to the district court. See Baker v. District of

Columbia, 326 F.3d 1302, 1308 (D.C. Cir. 2003) (internal

quotation marks and brackets omitted). Accordingly, though we

will affirm the district court’s finding of fiduciary breach, we

will reverse its preclusion holding and limit Johnson’s liability

on this count to a maximum of $17,475.

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With Johnson’s exposure thus restricted, the amount of

Rwanda’s damages becomes obvious. In disbursing the

$55,000, Johnson paid $24,500 to Van Kloberg (the RWG

lobbyist) and Van Kloberg’s lobbying firm. See RWG, 227 F.

Supp. 2d at 56. As to the July 22 agreement, the district court

found that any work Van Kloberg or his organization performed

“would have been of a private nature and for Mr. Uwimana’s

personal benefit, rather than work for the Government of

Rwanda.” Id. at 57. Clear, unchallenged findings thus establish

that Johnson expended at least $24,500 on personal services for

Uwimana. Because Johnson’s fiduciary breach—assisting

Uwimana without proper authorization—caused all these

expenditures, totaling well over Rwanda’s maximum recovery,

we will direct entry of judgment for $17,475 based on the July

22 counts.

III.

The remaining issues—attorney’s fees, punitive damages,

and prejudgment interest—need not long detain us. Because

Rwanda failed first to appeal the magistrate’s denial of

attorney’s fees to the district judge, it has forfeited its right to

appeal that issue here. Though it is true, as Rwanda points out,

that the applicable referral order cited a local rule that says

nothing about objecting in the district court, local rules must be

“consistent with” the federal rules, Fed. R. Civ. P. 83(a)(1), and

the Federal Rule of Civil Procedure on magistrate referrals

makes plain that objections to magistrate rulings are forfeited

absent timely challenge in the district court, see Fed. R. Civ. P.

72; see also CNPq—Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento

Cientificio e Technologico v. Inter-Trade, Inc., 50 F.3d 56, 59

(D.C. Cir. 1995) (per curiam).

As to punitive damages, “[i]n a case tried without a jury,

whether an award of punitive damages is warranted is a matter

committed to the discretion of the trial court.” Wash. Med. Ctr.,

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Inc. v. Holle, 573 A.2d 1269, 1284 (D.C. 1990). Given the

serious fiduciary breaches discussed above, the district court’s

decision to award punitive damages could hardly have

constituted an abuse of discretion. Nevertheless, and without

suggesting that $10,000 is necessarily inappropriate, we will

remand the amount of the award for reconsideration in light of

our reduction of Johnson’s underlying liability from $56,800 to

$19,275 ($1,800 plus $17,475).

Finally, the magistrate judge, believing that a District of

Columbia statute constrained his choice of interest rate, awarded

Rwanda prejudgment interest at six percent per year. Yet the

law in question merely sets the default interest rate “upon the

loan or forbearance of money, goods, or things in action in the

absence of an expressed contract.” See D.C. Code Ann. § 28-

3302(a). As the D.C. Court of Appeals has held, this provision

has no bearing on prejudgment interest in actions, like Rwanda’s

tort claims against Johnson, that involve neither loans nor

forbearances. See In re Estate of Jung, 801 A.2d 59, 60 (D.C.

2002) (addressing claims against an estate and finding section

28-3302(a) inapplicable because the claimant’s “share of his

mother’s estate was not a loan from him to the Estate[,] [n]or did

his waiting to receive that share constitute a forbearance on [his]

part”); cf. Duggan v. Keto, 554 A.2d 1126, 1140-41 (D.C. 1989)

(allowing award of prejudgment interest in a tort action “to the

extent that it will make the injured party whole” but remanding

the question whether section 28-3302(a) governed the interest

rate). Accordingly, we will remand the award so that the district

court can select an interest rate without regard to the D.C.

statute.

We will also remand the principal amount, though not for

the reason Rwanda suggests. Whereas Rwanda argues that

Johnson must pay interest on portions of the MOU payment

covered by the other defendants’ settlement, we review denial

of prejudgment interest only for abuse of discretion, see Bucheit

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v. Palestine Liberation Org., 388 F.3d 346, 351 (D.C. Cir.

2005), and the district court can hardly have abused its

discretion by ordering Johnson to pay interest only on amounts

he himself owes. But because our reduction of Johnson’s

primary liability may require recalculation of the interest award,

we will nonetheless remand this issue as well.

IV.

In sum, although we affirm the judgment against Johnson

for breach of fiduciary duty as to both the MOU and the July 22

agreement, we limit Rwanda’s recovery under the latter to

$17,475, resulting in a total award of $19,275. We also affirm

the award of punitive damages, but remand for reconsideration

of the amount. With respect to Rwanda’s cross-appeal, we deem

forfeited the appeal of attorney’s fees and remand the award of

prejudgment interest for recalculation consistent with this

opinion.

So ordered.

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