Opinion ID: 884642
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Failure to instruct jury as to contract's enforceability

Text: ¶ 33 Eve next asserts the District Court erred in refusing to instruct the jury that the parties' professional employment agreement was a binding contract. Eve offered the following as its nineteenth proposed instruction: You are instructed that the following facts are true and require no proof: Catherine Allen provided accounting services to former clients of Joseph Eve & Co. On or before December 31, 1995, Allen performed $58,806.20 of work for clients who had formerly been clients of Eve. Allen collected $34,574.75 of this during 1995, $2,608.45 was owing at the end of 1995, and $150.00 was uncollectible. Allen did not bill the remaining $21,773.00 until after December 31, 1995. The Professional Employment Agreement between Joseph Eve & Co. and Catherine Allen, Exhibit 2, was a binding contract. ¶ 34 The District Court issued Eve's proposed instruction number 19 as instruction number 11, but in so doing deleted the final sentence regarding the binding nature of the contract. Eve argues the court erred in failing to abide by its prior summary judgment ruling and in refusing to instruct the jury that, as a matter of law, the employment contract was enforceable. ¶ 35 We review the district court's refusal to give jury instructions for an abuse of discretion. See Northwest Truck & Trailer Sales, Inc. v. Dvorak (1994), 269 Mont. 150, 157, 887 P.2d 260, 264. ¶ 36 As noted above, the District Court ruled on summary judgment that paragraph nine of the parties' employment contract was not unreasonable, and was thus enforceable. The court did not, however, rule upon the question of liability and thus did not determine whether the contract was ultimately binding upon either party under the circumstances of this case. In other words, although the District Court addressed the contract's enforceability as a matter of law, it did not address the contract's effect, binding or not, upon the parties under the facts in this case. Actually, the last sentence in the court's instruction number 11, which Eve argues should have been included but was stricken by the District Court, amounts to a comment on the evidence. Accordingly, we hold the District Court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to direct the jury that the contract at issue was binding upon the parties.