Title: Decker v. MARSHALL-DeKALB ELEC. CO-OP.
Citation: 659 So. 2d 926
Docket Number: 1931522
State: Alabama
Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court
Date: April 21, 1995

659 So. 2d 926 (1995)
George Paul DECKER and Max Davidson
v.
MARSHALL-DeKALB ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE.
1931522.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
April 21, 1995.
*927 John T. Robertson IV and Ralph K. Strawn, Jr. of Henslee, Robertson &amp; Strawn, L.L.C., Gadsden, for appellants.
James G. Adams, Jr. of Eyster, Key, Tubb, Weaver &amp; Roth, Decatur, for appellee.
RICHARD L. JONES, Retired Justice.
George Paul Decker and Max Davidson sued the Marshall-DeKalb Electric Cooperative, alleging breach of contract and claiming damages for lost profits and mental anguish they contended were the proximate result of the alleged breach. The trial court entered a judgment on a jury verdict for Marshall-DeKalb, and this appeal followed. We affirm.
Pursuant to a "Power Contract," the Tennessee Valley Authority ("TVA") supplies Marshall-DeKalb with electricity for its customers. Decker and Davidson own mobile home parks and are customers of Marshall-DeKalb. In 1982, Marshall-DeKalb contacted its mobile home park customers in writing, to inform them of a change in Marshall-DeKalb's procedure for supplying and billing for electrical service to mobile home parks.
In an earlier action by Davidson against Marshall-DeKalb, Davidson challenged the new billing procedure for mobile home parks (the 1982 procedure change in issue in the instant appeal). In that earlier action, the trial court entered a judgment for Marshall-DeKalb. We quote pertinent portions from this Court's opinion in the appeal in that earlier case:
Davidson v. Marshall-DeKalb Electric Cooperative, 495 So. 2d 1058, 1059-60 (Ala.1986) ("Davidson I") (emphasis in original).
This Court reversed the trial court's judgment in Davidson I, holding that Davidson did, indeed, have standing to challenge Marshall-DeKalb's change in billing procedures.
Id. at 1060-61.
Following the Court's decision in Davidson I, Marshall-DeKalb added another option for supplying electricity to mobile home parks. Marshall-DeKalb's manager, Tom Wheeler, contacted mobile home park owners via the following memorandum, dated September 26, 1986:
In their complaint in this second case, filed in August 1988, Decker and Davidson stated that they are intended third-party beneficiaries of the TVA/Marshall-DeKalb contract, which provides 1) that the electricity supplied under that contract is for the benefit of the consumers, and 2) that Marshall-DeKalb is prohibited from selling electricity for submetering or resale.
Decker and Davidson specifically alleged that Marshall-DeKalb violated its contract with TVA by refusing to establish electric service in the names of Decker's and Davidson's mobile home park tenants, requiring instead that the service be established in the name of the owner of the mobile home park and that the owner be responsible for seeing that the bill for the electric service was paid. Decker and Davidson's claims and their supporting evidence concentrated on Marshall-DeKalb's original two options, Plan A and Plan B; then contended that Plan C was not a viable option because, by its own terms, it was susceptible to change.
The trial court denied Davidson and Decker's motions for a directed verdict on the issue of Marshall-DeKalb's liability for breach of contract. It also denied Marshall-DeKalb's motion for a directed verdict, based on a sufficiency-of-the-evidence ground.
In denying Marshall-DeKalb's motion for a directed verdict, the trial judge implicitly accepted the mobile home park owners' contention that the option of Plan C did not, as a matter of law, entitle Marshall-DeKalb to a directed verdict. Thus, this issue, along with the meaning and application of the TVA/Marshall-DeKalb contract, as it related to Plans A and B, was submitted, with appropriate instructions, to the jury. Because this ruling was not adverse to Decker and Davidson, it is not reviewable on this appeal.
The jury returned a verdict in favor of Marshall-DeKalb and against Decker and Davidson, and the trial court entered a judgment thereon. Decker and Davidson separately moved for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict or, alternatively, for a new trial, and also separately moved for the trial court to alter, amend, or vacate the judgment. Those post-judgment motions were denied, and Decker and Davidson appealed.
When reviewing a judgment based on a jury verdict, this Court applies a narrow standard of review:
Campbell v. Burns, 512 So. 2d 1341, 1343 (Ala.1987); Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. McClinton, 631 So. 2d 232, 233-34 (Ala.1993).
Strengthening the presumption of the correctness of the jury's verdict here is the trial court's denial of the post-judgment motions for a JNOV or a new trial. First Alabama Bank v. Prudential Life Ins. Co., 619 So. 2d 1313, 1317 (Ala.1993). Our review of the record convinces us that the evidence was not so decidedly against the verdict as to clearly indicate that it was wrong and unjust.
Decker and Davidson argue that the trial court committed reversible error when it failed to direct a verdict in their favor and, instead, held that the TVA/Marshall-DeKalb contract provisions in issue here were ambiguous; when it allowed Marshall-DeKalb to present evidence as to the meaning of the ambiguous provisions; and when it allowed *930 the jury to consider this evidence in interpreting the contract.
Specifically, according to Decker and Davidson, the terms "submetering," "resale," and "shall not directly or indirectly sell, sublet, assign, or otherwise dispose of the electric service or any part thereof," expressly set out in the contract, are clear and unambiguous. Therefore, say Decker and Davidson, there was no need to allow Marshall-DeKalb's witnesses to testify regarding the "custom and usage" assigned to those terms by the electric power industry or regarding the intent of TVA and Marshall-DeKalb in including those terms in the contract.
Fouts v. Beall, 518 So. 2d 1236, 1239 (Ala. 1987) (citations omitted).
Rivers v. Oakwood College, 442 So. 2d 74, 76 (Ala.1983).
We agree with the trial court's ruling that the contract here in issue is ambiguous as it relates to the provisions prohibiting the submetering and resale of the electric power supplied to Marshall-DeKalb customers. Decker and Davidson themselves point out that the terms "submetering" and "resale" are not defined by the contract or by any other document relating to the contract. However, contrary to Decker and Davidson's assertions that the absence of defining language renders the contract clear and unambiguous, it is the absence of definitions, under these circumstances, that provides the ambiguity that requires the factfinder to determine the true meaning of the contract.
The record, particularly that portion presenting the testimony at trial, convinces us that there was substantial evidence from which the factfinderhere, the jurycould infer the intent of the parties to the TVA/Marshall-DeKalb Power Contract and thus determine the true meaning of the contract. Witnesses representing both parties to the contract (TVA and Marshall-DeKalb) consistently testified that the prohibitions on submetering and reselling electric power were placed in the contract to prevent a utility such as Marshall-DeKalb from reselling electricity to another utility, or to any entity for profit, and that the policies adopted by Marshall-DeKalb for providing electric service to mobile home parks did not violate any contractual prohibitions against submetering or reselling electric power.
Rate analyst James L. Nicholson, a TVA employee for 30 years, stated in his affidavit that his job required him to "study and review... operations of the 160 TVA power distributors in connection with the administration of TVA's wholesale power contract with the distributors." Nicholson testified that the intent behind the submetering prohibition was to prevent "the purchase of electricity from TVA by a power distributor such as Marshall-DeKalb for resale to a retail customer who resells it again to someone else." Nicholson also testified that the submetering procedures for mobile home parks were not unusual, were permissible, and did not violate the distributor's contract with TVA.
The deposition testimony of Thomas Wheeler, former general manager of Marshall-DeKalb, was read into the record at trial. Wheeler, who had been employed by Marshall-DeKalb for over 30 years, stated that TVA had assured Marshall-DeKalb that the prohibition of "submetering" in no way prevented Marshall-DeKalb's method for supplying and billing for electric service to mobile home parks. Wheeler testified that the reason for the submetering provision in *931 the TVA contract was to prevent Marshall-DeKalb from selling electrical power to another utility.
James Wallace Stewart, Marshall-DeKalb's current general manager, testified that the TVA contract provisions disallowing submetering and the resale of electricity were included to prevent distributors such as Marshall-DeKalb from buying electricity from TVA and reselling it, "for economic gain," to another electric distributor "who is in business exclusively for the resale of electricity."
Darrell Wayne Smith, TVA district engineer, testified that part of his daily duties was the interpretation and application of the power contract between TVA and its distributors. Smith stated that certain words and terms included in the contract, including "submetering" and "resale," have developed definitions unique to the power industry. According to Smith, submetering and reselling are prohibited by the contract with the "intent and design" to keep distributors such as Marshall-DeKalb from reselling electric power for a profit.
Smith testified that the mobile home park owners' practice of installing meters at individual mobile home sites within the park and the further practice of charging a 5% administrative fee for reading the individual meters and collecting and paying their tenants' bills are not considered by TVA as the prohibited submetering or resale of electric power. Specifically, stated Smith, none of Marshall-DeKalb's service and billing options for mobile home parks (Plans A, B, and C) violates the contract prohibition against a customer's directly or indirectly reselling electric power.
It is abundantly clear that the jury's verdict was supported by substantial evidence and that the trial court correctly denied Decker's and Davidson's post-judgment motions for a JNOV or a new trial. The judgment is affirmed.
This opinion was prepared by retired Justice RICHARD L. JONES, sitting as a Justice of this Court pursuant to § 12-18-10(e), Ala.Code 1975.
AFFIRMED.
HORNSBY, C.J., and MADDOX, ALMON, SHORES, HOUSTON, KENNEDY, INGRAM, COOK and BUTTS, JJ., concur.