Source: http://masslegalresources.com/tag/group
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 12:17:41+00:00

Document:
This case concerns a dispute over coverage between an insured and its insurer. Defendant Raw Seafoods, Inc. (RSI) is a seafood processor. In 2012, an RSI customer, Atlantic Capes Fisheries, Inc. (Atlantic), filed an action in federal court alleging that RSI’s negligent processing of its scallops resulted in their premature spoilage. RSI’s insurer, plaintiff Hanover Insurance Group, Inc. (Hanover), agreed to defend RSI under a reservation of rights and then filed the present action, seeking a declaration that it had no duty to indemnify RSI for any judgment Atlantic obtained. After the federal court judge granted summary judgment in favor of Atlantic and entered judgment against RSI, the parties filed cross motions for partial summary judgment in the instant action. This Court (Roach, J.) granted summary judgment in favor of Hanover but the Appeals Court reversed. 91 Mass.App.Ct. 401 (2017). RSI now renews it Motion for Partial Summary Judgment. For the reasons that follow, the Motion is Allowed.
RSI is a seafood processing facility in Fall River. Atlantic, a seafood company that sells scallops and other seafood, regularly uses RSI to apportion, pack, and freeze the fresh scallops that it purchases from fishing vessels. Upon delivery of Atlantic’s scallops, RSI staff inspects the scallops for quality, reports the results to Atlantic, and receives processing instructions. After processing, the scallops are transported to a third-party cold storage facility, Arctic Cold Storage (Arctic), from which Atlantic ships its customers’ orders.
In July 2011, a batch of scallops that RSI had processed made their way through customs in Denmark where it was observed that the scallops were decomposed and emitting a strong smell of ammonia. They were deemed unacceptable for human consumption and sent back to the United States. Once in the United States, the Food and Drug Administration tested the batch and confirmed that it was spoiled. The batch of scallops was then returned to Arctic’s facility, where representatives from Atlantic and RSI jointly inspected the shipment and again confirmed the damage. They also inspected another batch of scallops processed by RSI around the same time as the rejected batch, and discovered more damaged scallops.
At the time, Hanover insured RSI through a Commercial General Liability (CGL) Policy. The Policy provides in relevant part that Hanover “will pay those sums that the insured becomes legally obligated to pay as damages because of ‘bodily injury’ or ‘property damage’ to which this insurance applies.” The Policy applies to “property damage” that is caused by an “occurrence,” which is defined as “an accident, including continuous or repeated exposure to substantially the same general harmful conditions.” The Policy contains several exclusions as well as a “special broadening endorsement,” which modifies the scope of certain exclusions.
In June 2012, Atlantic sued RSI in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, alleging that the damage to the scallops was caused by RSI’s negligence. Hanover agreed to defend RSI under a reservation of rights. Shortly thereafter, Hanover filed the present lawsuit, seeking a declaratory judgment that either the damage to the scallops was not caused by an “occurrence” within the meaning of the Policy, or that certain Policy exclusions applied, such that it had no duty to indemnify RSI for any judgment Atlantic obtained. RSI asserted counterclaims for breach of contract and violations of G.L. cc. 93A and 176D, and further alleged that it was entitled to a declaration that the damage was covered. Upon motion by RSI, the Court stayed discovery pending resolution of the federal litigation.
While the stay was in place, discovery proceeded in the federal action. In deposition testimony, the president of RSI, Jason Hutchens, conceded that the scallops were delivered to RSI in good condition, but that “somewhere in [RSI’s] system, the product got messed up.” Hutchens testified: “[I]n almost the seventeen years we’ve been doing this, we’ve never seen anything like this before . . . we beat our heads against the wall for, it seemed like months, trying to figure this out. We have never seen anything like it and have not seen anything after this problem. But we can’t put our hands around it, how it happened and why it happened . . . we don’t know.” Hutchens agreed, however, that the damage occurred while the scallops were in RSI’s custody and was “the result of some, as yet, unknown failure on the part of [RSI’s] processing people or handling people within [RSI’s] plant.” The precise cause of the damage remains unknown.
until they were delivered to Arctic in a frozen state, and that nothing occurred after that delivery that would have caused the damage. Agreeing with this reasoning, the federal court allowed Atlantic’s motion.
After judgment entered against RSI, the parties in the instant case filed cross motions for partial summary judgment on the issue of coverage. Judge Roach granted summary judgment in favor of Hanover, concluding that RSI could not meet its burden of proving that the loss was caused by an “occurrence” because “there was no demonstrated accident distinct from [RSI’s] performance of its work.” In reaching that conclusion, Judge Roach relied on Pacific Indemnity Co. v. Lampro (Lampro), 86 Mass. App. Ct. 60, 65 (2014), reasoning that the possibility that raw seafood could be spoiled or damaged during handling is a “normal, foreseeable and expected incident” of the seafood processing business and is therefore not an accident.
to defend and (3) RSI’s counterclaims for breach of contract and violations of G. L. cc. 93A and 176D.” Id. at 411.
As the insured, RSI bears the initial burden of proving that its claim falls within the scope of coverage provided by the Policy. See Boazova v. Safety Ins. Co., 462 Mass. 346, 351 (2012). That means that RSI must demonstrate that the claimed loss (here the damage to Atlantic’s scallops) was caused by an “occurrence.” In moving for summary judgment, RSI argues that the undisputed facts and the legal principles set forth in the Appeals Court’s decision in this case establish that RSI’s liability to Atlantic arose out of an “occurrence” within the meaning of the Policy. This Court agrees, in large part based on the reasoning of the Appeals Court.
Hanover argues, however, that the Appeals Court did not hold that RSI was entitled to judgment as a matter of law and that there may be facts which would show this was not an accident. Because discovery has been stayed, Hanover has had little opportunity to determine if such facts exist. Hanover contends that it needs more information regarding the procedures that RSI followed in processing the scallops, the materials it used, the purpose of processing and any communications regarding this issue. But the Appeals Court made it quite clear that Hanover was bound by the federal court’s decision that the damage to the scallops was due to RSI’s negligence, not as part of the ordinary work process and not the result of any intentional conduct. Hanover cannot relitigate this factual determination. Accordingly, there is no basis to seek this additional discovery.
It is also clear from the Appeals Court’s decision that that the damages for which RSI seeks coverage arose out of an “occurrence.”1 Hanover relied (and continues to rely) on Lampro in support of its position that this was not an occurrence, but the Appeals Court made it clear that Lampro was different. In that case, the insured was hired to cut down trees. The harm for which it sought coverage arose because it cut down too many trees, not because it cut down the trees in an improper manner. The harm thus did not arise because of a fortuitous or unexpected event but because of an intentional decision that occurred in the course of the insured’s ordinary work process, which was cutting down trees. In contrast, damaging scallops was not part of RSI’s ordinary work process; rather, it was an “unexpected happening without intention or design” and thus an “accident.” See Liberty Mut. Ins. Co. v. Tabor, 407 Mass. 354, 358 (1990) (construing that term in an auto policy to find that there was coverage for an auto accident caused by the insured’s negligence). The Appeals Court reasoned that the instant case was controlled not by Lampro but by Beacon Textiles, 355 Mass. at 646, where it was held that a loss sustained by the insured as a result of yarn changing color was an “accident” and therefore covered by the insurance policy. Although the precise cause for the change in color was never determined, it took place while in the insured’s possession and therefore was an “accident.” The same conclusion is compelled here.
1 Indeed, in remanding the case, the Appeals Court did not suggest that there continued to be an issue regarding whether this was an “occurrence,” instead instructing this Court to determine whether any exclusions to the policy applied.
2 In doing so, however, the Appeals Court acknowledged that this was a question of law.
Product”), and Exclusion (n) (“Recall of Products, Work or Impaired Property”). This Court concludes that, as a matter of contract interpretation, these exclusions do not apply.
Exclusion (k) precludes coverage for property damage to “Your Product arising out of it or any part of it.” The Policy defines “Your Product” as “Any goods or products, other than real property, manufactured sold, handled, distributed or disposed of by . . . You.” “The purpose of the exclusion is to prevent the insured from using its product liability coverage as a form of property insurance to cover the cost of repairing or replacing its own defective products or work.” Commerce Ins. Co. v. Betty Caplette Builders, Inc., 420 Mass. 87, 92 (1995), quoting 2 R. Long, Liability Insurance Section 11.09(2) (1993). It does not apply when the insured’s liability results from the provision of services. See Todd Shipyards Corp. v. Turbine Serv., Inc., 674 F.2d 401, 420 (5th Cir. 1982). Here, the exclusion does not apply because the undisputed facts demonstrate that RSI was hired to perform a service for Atlantic and the damage occurred when it processed the scallops as part of that service. The scallops themselves were not RSI’s product.
Hanover contends that it would be unfair to draw that conclusion without knowing more about RSI”s processing procedures. This assumes that this processing necessarily turns the raw scallops that it received from Atlantic into something else entirely. Regardless of the processing procedures utilized by RSI, it is undisputed that Atlantic harvested and delivered the scallops to RSI and that after processing, those same scallops went to Arctic’s facility. RSI did not turn the scallops into a fundamentally different product — for example, by incorporating them into a scallop chowder. Contrast Holsum Food Div. of Harvest States Cooperatives v. Home Ins. Co., 162 Wis. 2d 563, 566-567 (1991) (insured hired to mix ingredients supplied by customer to make customer’s barbeque sauce); Nu-Pak, Inc. v. Wine Specialties Int’l, Ltd., 253 Wis. 2d 825, 828 (Wis. Ct. App. 2002) (insured hired to blend ingredients supplied by customer to make customer’s alcoholic beverage).
coverage for costs associated with the removal of non-damaged products but rather for costs connected to the recall of products that were actually damaged. Accordingly, this exclusion does not apply.
Hanover asserts that there is a material dispute of fact as to whether all of the scallops were actually spoiled. In the federal action, however, the evidence presented to the court on the summary judgment motion was that the weight of the damaged scallops was 58,824 pounds and that the value of those scallops was $ 463,735.86. The federal court entered judgment in favor of Atlantic for that amount, thus implicitly determining that 58,824 pounds of scallops were actually damaged. Hanover is bound by those figures.
For the forgoing reasons, Raw Seafoods, Inc.’s Renewed Motion for Partial Summary Judgment is ALLOWED with regard to the question of coverage. This matter is scheduled for a status conference on February ____, 2018 at 2:00 to set a schedule for resolution of what remains of the case.
allege facts sufficient to show that either of them ever employed plaintiffs.1 For the reasons set forth below, this Court concludes that the Motion must be Denied.
CAG is a domestic corporation that manages and controls the business operations and employment matters for all of the sixteen automotive dealerships that comprise the “Colonial Automotive Group,” including Gordon Chevrolet, Colonial Nissan, Colonial Dodge, and Gordon Volkswagen. ¶¶ 5, 15. Gordon Chevrolet (formerly known as Gordon Chevrolet Geo) is a foreign corporation with a principal office in Acton, Massachusetts. ¶ 5. Colonial Nissan, Colonial Dodge, and Gordon Volkswagen are all domestic corporations with principal offices in Medford, Hudson, and Westborough, Massachusetts, respectively. ¶¶ 6-9. As sub-corporations or subsidiaries of CAG, the dealerships function as CAG’s agents. ¶ 36.
CAG and the dealerships all do business under the Colonial Automotive Group umbrella, and regularly sell cars to members of the public. ¶¶ 15-16, 34, 41. CAG controls, operates, oversees, and/or directs both the business and employment operations for the dealerships, including hiring and firing, creating and implementing payroll policies, overseeing employee performance, maintaining personnel and employment records, and controlling work schedules. ¶ 33. CAG also operates a general website for all of the dealerships, representing the group “as a single ‘dealership’ that actively employs over 600 employees.” ¶ 34.
1 Defendants also contended that the plaintiffs did not satisfy the statutory prerequisite of first filing a Wage Act complaint with the Attorney General’s Office. Plaintiffs have since amended the Complaint to eliminate this procedural issue.
With respect to Gordon Chevrolet, the Complaint alleges that Gordon Chevrolet assists CAG as its agent in the management and control of business and employment operations for all of the dealerships. ¶ 19. Additionally, plaintiffs Malebranche and Lamandier executed documents acknowledging their employment with Gordon Chevrolet. ¶¶ 49, 51. Malebranche’s document acknowledges an agreement with “Gordon Chevrolet Geo dba Colonial Chevrolet,” and Lamandier’s acknowledges an agreement with “Gordon Chevrolet Geo dba Colonial Nissan.” Id.
Malebranche, Lamandier, Pezzano and Farias were all employed as inside car salesmen who worked at different dealerships under the CAG umbrella. ¶¶ 1-4. They worked to sell cars on behalf of CAG and its dealerships. ¶¶ 1-4, 48, 50, 52-53. The defendants were aware that plaintiffs and other similarly situated sales employees often worked more than forty hours per week and on Sundays without receiving compensation required by the Wage Act. ¶¶ 55, 56, 62. This was the result of a “companywide practice and policy” of CAG and the dealerships. ¶ 54, 68.
(b) (6) motion). Thus, that the complaint relies on facts that are improbable does not support dismissal so long as those allegations, “even if doubtful in fact,” “raise a right to relief above the speculative level.” Iannacchino, 451 Mass. at 636, quoting Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007). This Court must draw all reasonable inferences from those factual allegations in favor of the nonmoving party. See Iannacchino, 451 Mass. at 625 n.7, citing Nader v. Citron, 372 Mass. 96, 98 (1977). Finally, it is important to note that employment status is ordinarily a question of fact that can rarely be decided on a motion to dismiss. See Morris v. Massachusetts Maritime Academy, 409 Mass. 179, 194 (1991) (affirming lower court’s denial of motion to dismiss in part because whether an employer-employee relationship existed under the Jones Act was a question of fact). This Court concludes that the Complaint satisfies the 12(b) (6) standard.
relationship exists is ordinarily a question of fact and thus cannot easily be decided on a Rule 12(b) (6) motion.
Noting that the case before it was “not the ordinary case,” the court in Gallagher affirmed the lower court’s allowance of a motion to dismiss because an extensive regulatory framework governed the work arrangement at issue and the corresponding relationships between the various parties. The plaintiffs were personal care attendants who performed work in the homes of individual consumers covered by MassHealth. The defendant acted as a “fiscal intermediary agency” between MassHealth and the consumer. The Appeals Court concluded that the defendant was not an employer under the statutory test because the services were rendered to the individual consumers, not the defendant agency. The Court also concluded that the plaintiffs could not satisfy the common law test because the defendant did not exercise sufficient control over the plaintiff’s work: it was MassHealth, not the defendant, that set the plaintiffs’ work schedule and determined payroll policies. 2 In the instant case, no regulatory framework governs the employer-employee relationship of car sales employees at the Colonial Automotive Group dealerships, suggesting that whether such a relationship exists for purposes of the Wage Act is a question of fact. The issue is whether the Complaint pleads sufficient facts to satisfy the two tests described in Gallagher. This Court concludes that it does.
2 Gallagher left open the question of whether the statutory “services” test entirely supplants the common law “control” test. In the absence of any appellate case that deals directly with this issue, this Court concludes that the common law test supplements the statutory test – that is, that both can be applied to determine if a defendant is an employer under the Wage Act.
single dealership with over 600 employees. CAG controls and manages the business operations and employment matters for all of the dealerships, which implement CAG employment policies and procedures, including those that pertain to wage and overtime compensation. Finally, plaintiffs attached to their memorandum in opposition certain agreements signed by plaintiffs Malebranche and Lamandier, apparently with CAG, which state among other things that failure to comply with “The Colonial Automotive Group’s information security policies and procedures” could result in “termination of my employment with The Colonial Automotive Group.” Although these documents are not specifically referenced in the Complaint and thus should not be considered on this 12 (b) (6) motion, they do indicate that if discovery were allowed to proceed, there may be further information that would support plaintiffs’ claim that they were employed by CAG.
Although a closer call, this Court also concludes that the Complaint alleges enough to show an employment relationship between plaintiffs and Gordon Chevrolet, particularly if this Court draws all reasonable inference in favor of the plaintiffs. At least two of the plaintiffs executed agreements acknowledging the terms of their employment with “Gordon Chevrolet Geo dba Gordon Chevrolet” and “Gordon Chevrolet Geo dba Colonial Nissan.” This suggests that they do provide services to Gordon Chevrolet or alternatively, that Gordon Chevrolet maintains some control over the terms and conditions of their employment. The Complaint also alleges that Gordon Chevrolet assists CAG as its agent in its management and control of the business and employment matters for the dealerships. In short, whether Gordon Chevrolet or CAG should remain in the case is best decided after plaintiffs have had an opportunity to explore these issues in discovery.
For the foregoing reasons, the defendants’ Motion to Dismiss is DENIED. This case is scheduled for a Rule 16 conference November ___, 2018 at 2:00.
AIDS SUPPORT GROUP OF CAPE COD, INC. vs. TOWN OF BARNSTABLE & others.
Barnstable. February 14, 2017. – June 14, 2017.
Civil action commenced in the Superior Court Department on November 10, 2015.
A motion for a preliminary injunction was heard by Raymond P. Veary, Jr., J., and the case was reported to the Appeals Court by Robert C. Rufo, J.
VINCENT NGUYEN vs. ARBELLA INSURANCE GROUP.
Middlesex. February 16, 2017. – May 23, 2017.
Present: Kafker, C.J., Wolohojian, & Sacks, JJ.
Insurance, Insurer’s obligation to defend, Defense of proceedings against insured, Homeowner’s insurance, Business exclusion. Contract, Insurance. Practice, Civil, Summary judgment.
THE HANOVER INSURANCE GROUP, INC. vs. RAW SEAFOODS, INC.
Suffolk. September 16, 2016. – April 26, 2017.
Present: Agnes, Neyman, & Henry, JJ.
Civil action commenced in the Superior Court Department on September 21, 2012.
concludes that Premier’s motion must be DENIED as to Lopes’ duty to indemnify but ALLOWED as to its duty to defend.
The relevant facts in the summary judgment record, viewed in the light most favorable to the plaintiffs, are as follows. Hillside and Jones engage in commercial development and construction projects. On August 23, 2011, Hillside as the owner/developer and Premier as the general contractor entered into an agreement to construct a FedEx freight facility at 300 Bartlett Street, Northborough, Massachusetts (the Project). Because the site was on a relatively steep slope, a significant amount of cut and fill and excavation work was required to prepare it for construction. The plaintiffs retained Premier to perform this work. Premier in turn retained Lopes as a subcontractor to perform demolition, grading, and excavation for the Project. The defendant Haley was retained by Premier to provide on-site monitoring of the earthwork.
On September 21, 2011, Lopes began removing trees at the Project site, and excavation at the site continued through the fall. Hillside authorized Premier to proceed with the foundation installation in late December 2011, and footings and foundations for the Project were installed shortly thereafter. In February 2012, it was noticed that the walls appeared to have shifted laterally. Ultimately, it was determined that the foundations had settled and that this was caused by improper fill work. There are disputes of fact as to which entity – Premier, Lopes, or Haley – either alone or in combination with each other, was responsible for the foundation’s failure. By the time the building was stabilized and the site repaired, Hillside had spent more than $ 3 million in remedial work.
The Subcontractor [Lopes] shall indemnify and save harmless the Owner [Hillside] and the Contractor [Premier] and their officers, agents, servants and employees, from and against any and all claims, demands, suits, proceedings, liabilities, judgments, awards, losses, damages, costs and expenses, including attorneys’ fees, on account of . . . damage to or destruction of any property, directly or indirectly arising out of, relating to or in connection with the Work, whether or not due or claimed to be due in whole or in part to the active, passive or concurrent negligence or fault of the Subcontractor . . . and whether or not such claims, demands, suits or proceedings are just, unjust, groundless, false or fraudulent; and the Subcontractor shall and does hereby assume and agrees to pay for the defense of all such claims, demands, suits and proceedings….the Subcontractor shall not be required to indemnify the Contractor, his officers, agents, servants or employees against any such damages occasioned solely by acts or omissions of the contractor other than supervisory acts or omissions of the Contractor in the work.
Subcontractor shall indemnify and hold harmless PDBG . . . Owner . . . and agents and employees of any of them ( . . . “Indemnified Parties”) from and against claims, damages, losses and expenses, including, but not limited to, attorney’s fees arising out of or resulting from (i) performance or non-performance of the Work, (ii) breach of obligations of Subcontractor under the Contract Documents including, without limitation, defective Work . . ., or (v) any other act or omission with respect to the Work by Subcontractor . . . resulting in . . . injury to or destruction of property, or loss thereof.
PDBG Parties’ sole and absolute discretion, whether to contest any one or more of such claims or actions and Subcontractor shall be required to perform the obligations of Subcontractor set forth above regardless of whether PDBG Parties elect to contest such claim(s). If PDBG Parties elect to contest any such claim(s), PDBG Parties shall have the right to select PDBG Parties’ own counsel and control their defense and Subcontractor shall bear the cost of employing such counsel . . .
Hillside and Jones filed this action October 28, 2013. By letter dated December 27, 2013, Premier tendered its defense and indemnification of this matter to Lopes. Counsel for Lopes requested additional information, and on February 4, 2014, Premier issued a more detailed amended tender of defense and indemnity to Lopes. Thereafter, Lopes declined to defend and indemnify Premier under the subcontracts, and Premier eventually filed a cross claim against Lopes.
provisions must be construed wherever possible in a manner that “sustains their legality and enforceability.” This Court approaches the task of resolving the question before me with that in mind.
. . ., which requires a subcontractor to indemnify any party for injury to persons or damage to property not caused by the subcontractor or its employees, agents or subcontractors, shall be void.
In determining the validity of Indemnification Provisions #1 and #2, this Court focuses on the language of the clauses themselves rather than on the facts relating to the incident and an assessment of fault of the parties. See Herson v. New Boston Garden Corp., 40 Mass. App. Ct. 779, 786-787 (1996). That is because the purpose of such clauses is to make clear to the parties from the outset where the burden of acquiring insurance lies. Harnois v. Quannapowitt Dev., Inc., 35 Mass. App. Ct. 286, 288 (1993). “Indemnity provisions are not read with any bias in favor of the indemnitor and against the indemnitee; rather, such provisions are to be fairly and reasonably construed to ascertain the intention of the parties and to effectuate the purpose sought to be accomplished.” Urban Inv. & Dev. Co. v. Turner Constr. Co., 35 Mass. App. Ct. 100, 107 (1993).
indemnity for their sole causal negligence, but § 29C does not proscribe full indemnification when the conduct of the subcontractor is only a partial cause of the injury.” Ibid. Thus, a contractual indemnity arrangement whereby the subcontractor agrees to indemnify the contractor for the entire liability when both the subcontractor and the general contractor or owner are causally negligent, is not prohibited by Section 29C. What is forbidden is shifting that liability to a subcontractor even where it plays no role in causing the damages. The question before this Court is whether the indemnification provisions here permit that shifting. This Court concludes that they do.
Indemnification Provision #1 states that Lopes is required to indemnify Premier for “damage to or destruction of any property, directly or indirectly arising out of, relating to or in connection with the Work, whether or not due or claimed to be due in whole or in part to the active, passive or concurrent negligence or fault of the Subcontractor . . . .” By its terms, this provision would require Lopes to indemnify Premier for negligently performed work even where that negligent work was not done by Lopes. In this Court’s view, this violates Section 29C. The final sentence of Indemnification Provision #1 does not cure the problem. It states that Lopes shall not be required to indemnify Premier “against any damages occasioned solely by acts or omissions of the Contractor [Premier] other than supervisory acts or omissions of the contractor in the work.” (emphasis added). In other words, Lopes is required to indemnify Premier for its supervisory acts even though Lopes did nothing to cause the injury for which damages are claimed. Again, this is a violation of the statute.
Subcontracts: it includes all design, labor, materials, and equipment necessary to “produce the construction required by the Subcontract Agreement and other Contract Documents.” (Emphasis added). “Contract Documents” under the Subcontracts means the “Construction Contract,” which is in turn defined as the “agreement entered into by and between Owner and PDPG [Premier] referred to in the Subcontract Agreement relating to the Project.” Because this definition of “Work” necessarily encompasses work performed by others on the Project, it operates as no limitation at all on Lopes’ indemnification obligation: Lopes must indemnify Premier not only for Premier’s own actions, but for the actions of every other subcontractor Premier hired, even where Lopes played no role in the performance of that work.
Premier responds that the term “Work” must be construed in line with the overall obligation that the Subcontracts impose on Lopes. Part A of both Subcontracts defines “Work” to mean those obligations both in the Subcontract and in the Contract Documents that Lopes “agrees to perform.” Premier argues that, to the extent that the Contract Documents dictate what others are to do on the Project, then Lopes has not “agreed to perform” those other tasks and that this, as a consequence, narrows the definition of “Work” as used in the Indemnification Provisions. This is a stretch, at best, requiring the Court to put together and merge definitions from other parts of the Subcontracts in order to impose limitations that are not apparent from the plain language of the Indemnification Provisions themselves.
“relating to or in connection with the Work.” Thus, even with the contorted definition of “Work” that Premier urges this Court to accept, it clearly extends well beyond any “work” actually performed by Lopes. Indemnification Provision #2 is a bit more narrowly drawn, stating that the claim must arise out of or result from the “performance or nonperformance of the Work,” among other things. But it does not specify who has to have performed (or failed to perform) that “Work” in order to trigger the indemnification obligation, is thus must be read as extending to acts or omissions by others. In other words, Lopes could be required to indemnify Premier even where its acts or omissions did not play any part in causing the damage.
Although this Court agrees with Lopes that the two provisions impose indemnify obligations beyond that which is permitted by Section 29C, it does not follow that Lopes has no duty to defend. As the SJC explained in Herson v. New Boston Garden Corp., 40 Mass. App. Ct. at 786-787, the duty to defend is “ independent of and broader than the duty to indemnify” and the imposition of such a duty is not constrained by Section 29C, which makes no reference to it. As quoted above, the Subcontracts contain language requiring Lopes to defend Premier from claims or actions asserted against Premier, and to bear the cost of employing counsel if Premier chooses to contest the claims asserted against it. Lopes does not even attempt to explain in its written opposition why this language does not impose upon it a duty to defend Premier in this litigation. In any event, this Court concludes that it does.
This case arises out of the construction of a FedEx facility in Northborough, Massachusetts. Plaintiffs Hillside FXF, LLC (Hillside) and Jones Development Company, LLC (Jones) filed this action against defendants G. Lopes Construction, Inc. (Lopes), Premier Design + Build Group, LLC (Premier), and Haley & Aldrich, Inc. (Haley) seeking to recover damages relating to remedial work performed after the construction. This Court has already denied Haley’s summary judgment motion. This memorandum concerns the defendant Premier’s Motion for Summary Judgment as to plaintiffs’ claims against it. 1 Premier argues that release language in a change order bars all of the plaintiffs’ claims against it and that plaintiffs have in any event waived any claim because they failed to follow certain contractual provisions. After careful review of the summary judgment record, this Court concludes that there are questions of fact such that the Motion must be Denied.
1 Plaintiffs also filed a motion to strike three of Premier’s fact statements contained in Premier’s Superior Court Rule 9A (b) (5) statement of material facts. That motion is denied for the reasons stated in Premier’s opposition.
The relevant facts in the summary judgment record, viewed in the light most favorable to the plaintiffs, are as follows. Hillside and Jones engage in commercial development and construction projects. On August 23, 2011, Hillside as the owner/developer and Premier as the general contractor entered into an agreement to construct a FedEx freight facility at 300 Bartlett Street, Northborough, Massachusetts (the “Project”). Because the site was on a relatively steep slope, a significant amount of cut and fill and excavation work was required to prepare it for construction. The earthwork began in September 2011, with foundations and walls of the building installed in early 2012. Shortly thereafter, it was noticed that the walls appeared to have shifted laterally. Ultimately, it was determined that the foundations had settled and that this was caused by improper fill work. By the time the building was stabilized and the site repaired, Hillside had spent more than $ 3 million in remedial work.
Premier sent the plaintiffs a written notice of soil stability issues. Four days later, on March 30, 2012, plaintiffs sent Premier a notice that these issues arose from Premier’s defective work.
See Exhibit J. Kevin Jones signed Change Order 13 on behalf of the plaintiffs.
over the failure of the Project site, nor did he understand the language to constitute a release by plaintiffs of that much larger claim.
Premier makes two arguments in support of its motion for summary judgment. First, it contends that Change Order 13 is an enforceable release that bars all of the plaintiffs’ claims against Premier in this action. Second, it argues in the alternative that the plaintiffs’ contract claims against Premier are waived because plaintiffs failed to provide timely written notice of the damage to the property and of their claim that Premier’s work was defective. The Court will discuss each of these arguments in turn.
contract is susceptible to more than one construction. Where one construction is “fair, customary and such as prudent men would naturally execute,” and the other is “inequitable, unusual or such as reasonable men would not be likely to enter into,” the court must prefer the former. Chicago Title & Trust Co., v. Telco Capital Corp., 685 N.E.2d 952, 955-956 (Ill.App.1997), quoted in Bank of Commerce v. Fyre Lake Ventures, LLC., 84 F.Supp. 3d 807, 823 (C.D. Ill.2015) (denying summary judgment because of factual disputes as to meaning of release).
In opposing the motion, plaintiffs contend that reading Change Order 13 to release Premier from a $ 3 million damages claim in exchange for a $ 30,000 credit would be an absurd interpretation. This Court finds this argument to be persuasive. At the very least, this Court concludes that there is are genuine disputes of fact regarding the intent of the parties such that summary judgment on this basis would be improper. As noted by the plaintiffs, there is evidence in the summary judgment record suggesting that the only dispute that was intended to be resolved by the release language in Change Order 13 concerned the dispute between the parties regarding the general contractor’s fee on certain of the remedial work. This is a plausible interpretation of the release language, since it is immediately preceded by the words “credit to contractors [sic] fee.” That the language was not intended to foreclose the much larger claims asserted in this action is further supported by the fact that it was placed in a change order. As defined by the Agreement, a change order is an order authorizing a change in the work or an adjustment to the time in which the work is to be completed or the price to be paid. Thus, plaintiffs have some justification for their position that Jones, signing on behalf of plaintiffs, could not be reasonably expected to find a release of the magnitude argued by Premier in a change order that covered a relatively insignificant amount of additional work.
Premier’s second argument merits less discussion. Premier notes that the undisputed facts show that the problems in the building foundation were first observed on or around February 23, 2012, but that the plaintiffs did not issue any written notice of this defect until March 30, 2012. Premier contends that Article 9 of the Agreement required that this notice had to be given within ten days of discovery of the defect and that this delay amounted to a waiver of plaintiffs’ contractual claims. Article 9, however, says only that a claim against the liable party for injury to property must be made “within a reasonable time after the first observance of such injury or damage.” Clearly, a month is not an unreasonable time. Premier asserts that the notice had to be given within ten days, but this ten day requirement is contained in Article 7, not Article 9. Moreover, a reasonable interpretation of Article 7 is that it was to give a contractor a chance to correct its defective work before the owner corrects it and sends the contractor the bill. In any event, neither Article 7 nor Article 9 contains any waiver language.
For all of the foregoing reasons, Defendant Premier Design + Build Group, LLC’s Motion for Summary Judgment is DENIED.

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