Opinion ID: 221854
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Annex AK Claim Additional Facilities Rental

Text: In Article 8.3 of Modification Six, Lockheed and Greece agreed that line item 14, entitled U.S. Government Recoupments, would be in the amount of $6,097,706. (A. 408). As explained in Article 8.7 of Modification Six, this line item represented the amount of recoupment that the U.S. Government has directed to be collected by Lockheed from Greece. This amount was to be collected by [Lockheed] and paid to the U.S. Government and is not included in the Contract Price nor ... in the Payment Schedule. Article 8.7 went on to say that the method of payment, the frequency of payment[,] and other payment terms and information are included in ANNEX AK  U.S. GOVERNMENT RECOUPMENTS. Turning to Annex AK of Modification Six, one finds, as of September 30, 1991, a total recoupment amount of $29,047,706. This amount was comprised of two discrete components: (1) $1,891,146 for what Annex AK calls Additional Facility Rental Recoupment; and (2) $27,156,560 for Item Delivery Recoupment. At issue here is the amount for Additional Facility Rental Recoupment, which was a charge owed to the United States government for use of the United States' Fort Worth facility to produce F-16 aircraft for Greece. Yannacopoulos argues that, because Article 8.7 discussed Annex AK in terms of payment rather than collection, we must read that Annex as a representation that the defendants had paid the entire $29,047,706 recoupment amount to the United States Government by the time the parties executed Modification Six. But see Lamers, 168 F.3d at 1018 (noting that imprecise statements are not actionable false statements). Because General Dynamics allegedly never paid the $1,891,146 amount for Additional Facilities Rental Recoupment, Yannacopoulos insists that Annex AK was false. Yannacopoulos misreads the language of Modification Six. While Annex AK says that, between March 31, 1989 and September 30, 1991, General Dynamics had collected from Greece $29,047,706 in funds designated for recoupment, it cannot be read to say that this entire amount had already been repaid to the United States government. Footnote 4 to that Annex states that, out of that amount, $22,950,000 [was] refunded to the Greece commercial sales account of the [FMF] trust fund on [May 17, 1991]. That amount related solely to Item Delivery Recoupment, though, and not the Additional Facility Rental amount that Yannacopoulos says was never paid. Footnote 5 to Annex AK went on to explain that the remaining $6,097,706 recoupment amount  $1,891,146 for Additional Facility Rental and $4,206,560 for Item Delivery Recoupment  has been paid and moved below the line under [line item] 14. Footnote 5  the crucial provision of Modification Six  cannot reasonably be understood to say, falsely or otherwise, that the $6,097,706 in line item 14 had already been repaid to the United States government by the time Modification Six was executed. Line item 14 was the amount designated by the United States for collection from Greece. By saying that this amount has been paid, footnote 5 indicates that this designated amount has already been paid by Greece, not by Lockheed. [22] Because Modification Six never says that the $1,891,146 for facility rental had already been paid to the United States, it is irrelevant whether such a statement would have been false if it had actually been made.