Opinion ID: 1188165
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Excessive Interest Paid to Zions First National Bank

Text: The trial court found that because of the two-year delay in delivery of the cattle sales proceeds to intervenor, he was unable to repay a $50,000 loan from Zions First National Bank which fell due four months after the attachment. The court awarded $14,506.56 in damages to reimburse intervenor for interest incurred on the loan between July 2, 1973, the due date of the loan, and May 16, 1975, the date when intervenor received the sales proceeds. Plaintiff challenges this award on the ground that intervenor failed to show that he would have repaid the loan on time if the attachment had not occurred. However, intervenor's testimony provided evidence from which the trial court could have reached this conclusion. Intervenor and his wife both testified that they had invested most of their working capital in the cattle attached by plaintiff and that the unavailability of this capital made it difficult for them to meet their financial obligations. Intervenor also testified that they used most of their available funds during the period of attachment to pay debts owed to Montana institutions and that they were unable to borrow additional funds with which to pay Zions. The trial court properly awarded damages for the extra interest payments necessitated by plaintiff's delay in returning intervenor's money. However, in awarding the entire amount of excessive interest claimed by intervenor, the trial court partially duplicated an interest payment which they had already received from plaintiff. The Satisfaction of Judgment issued in the case which determined intervenor's ownership of the cattle (which constitutes part of the record before us) shows that on May 16, 1975, when Zions received its share of the $114,459.07 judgment money, plaintiff paid interest on that judgment to cover the period which had elapsed since the judgment date, June 4, 1974. This payment compensated intervenor for the interest paid to Zions during the second year of the two-year period during which the loan was overdue. The amount of interest incurred on the loan during the first of those two years, from July 2, 1973, to June 4, 1974, was $6,179.43, as shown by both the Satisfaction of Judgment and the judgment itself (also part of the record). This figure represents the portion of excess interest for which intervenor has not yet been compensated. We therefore modify the judgment to reduce intervenor's excess interest award to $6,179.43.