Opinion ID: 781994
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Intentional Interference with Business Relationship

Text: 145 Parks also claims that Defendants intentionally interfered with her business relationship with the producers of the Tribute album. To make a successful claim for tortious interference with a business relationship in Michigan, Parks must show an intentional doing of a per se wrongful act or the intentional doing of a lawful act with malice and unjustified in law for the purpose of invading ... contractual rights or business relationship[s]. Chrysler Int'l Corp. v. Cherokee Exp. Co., 134 F.3d 738, 745 (6th Cir.1998) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted)(applying Michigan law). This wrongful act must have hastened a contract breach or another breakdown of a business relationship. See Lakeshore Cmty. Hosp., Inc., v. Perry, 212 Mich.App. 396, 538 N.W.2d 24, 27 (1995). No such breach or breakdown occurred in this case. Parks cites dicta from Stormor v. Johnson, 587 F.Supp. 275 (W.D.Mich.1984), which suggests that Michigan might recognize a claim if a defendant's action made the plaintiff's business relationship more expensive or burdensome. Ignoring for the moment that Michigan has not clearly recognized a tort claim on such grounds, Parks has not brought forth evidence that Defendants' song Rosa Parks makes the production or promotion of the Tribute album more expensive or burdensome. Consequently, this claim must fail.