Opinion ID: 791347
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The contract's indemnity clause provides for attorney's fees in actions between the parties.

Text: 28 Because promises in a contract to indemnify the other party's attorney's fees run against the grain of the accepted policy that parties are responsible for their own attorneys' fees, Oscar Gruss & Son, Inc. v. Hollander, 337 F.3d 186, 199 (2d Cir.2003), courts applying New York law `should not infer a party's intention' to provide counsel fees as damages for a breach of contract `unless the intention to do so is unmistakably clear' from the language of the contract. Id. (quoting Hooper Assocs., Ltd. v. AGS Computers, Inc., 74 N.Y.2d 487, 492, 549 N.Y.S.2d 365, 548 N.E.2d 903 (1989)). Applying this rule in Hooper Associates, the New York Court of Appeals refused to read an attorney's fees provision as including claims between the parties themselves, as opposed to third-party claims, where the provision did not exclusively or unequivocally refer to such claims or otherwise support an inference that defendant promised to indemnify plaintiff for counsel fees in an action on the contract. 74 N.Y.2d at 492, 549 N.Y.S.2d 365, 548 N.E.2d 903. Reading the contract as a whole, the court also observed that its narrow interpretation of the indemnity clause was supported by other provisions in the contract which unmistakably relate[d] to third-party claims. Id. To read the indemnity clause as covering suits between the parties, the court found, would render other provisions meaningless. 4 Id. Applying a similar rationale in Oscar Gruss & Son, this Court refused to read an indemnity clause as providing for attorney's fees in breach-of-contract suits between the parties where the subsection of the contract providing for indemnification also contained language that indisputably applie[d] solely to third-party claims. 5 337 F.3d at 200; see also Bridgestone/Firestone, Inc. v. Recovery Credit Servs., Inc., 98 F.3d 13, 20-21 (2d Cir.1996) (applying New York law and holding that a contractual indemnity provision did not apply to a suit between the parties where its language could easily be read as limited to third party actions). 29 As originally written, the contract now before us included only one of the two indemnification provisions that appear in the contract's final form. This first provision requires indemnification of defendant by plaintiff in certain actions brought by third parties: 30 [The Ministry] will indemnify and hold harmless [Fine Host, Woodstock Ventures, Inc., Polygram Diversified Ventures, the Town of Saugerties and other entities] from any and all liabilities (i.e. bodily injury), damage (i.e. property), expenses (including reasonable attorney fees, court costs, and other costs) or actions of any kind or nature, arising, growing out of, or otherwise connected with any activity under this Agreement arising by the negligence of [Ministry] personnel. 31 (Emphasis added). 32 Before signing the contract, the parties added an addendum to the agreement that includes a second indemnification provision requiring indemnification of plaintiff by defendant. That is the provision at issue here. Significantly, the parties did not simply copy the structure and wording of the first provision in drafting the second; instead, they wrote an indemnity clause that sweeps more broadly, providing for reimbursement of attorney's fees regardless of the nature of the underlying action: 33 [The Ministry] shall be indemnified and held harmless from any actions resulting from the negligence of [defendant]; from any and all liabilities (i.e. bodily injury), damage (i.e. property), expenses (including reasonable attorney fees, court costs, and other costs) or actions of any kind or nature arising, growing out of, or otherwise connected with any activity under this Agreement. 34 We agree with plaintiff that the broad language of the second provision, when read in conjunction with the first provision, indicates unmistakably, Hooper Assocs., 74 N.Y.2d at 492, 549 N.Y.S.2d 365, 548 N.E.2d 903, that the parties intended for the second provision to apply to actions of any kind or nature, including actions between the parties. See also Sagittarius Broad. Corp. v. Evergreen Media Corp., 243 A.D.2d 325, 663 N.Y.S.2d 160, 161 (1st Dep't 1997) (holding, where language limiting indemnification to third-party actions appeared in only one of two key sentences in an indemnity clause, that the more expansive sentence encompassed attorney's fees in suits on the contract between the parties). Accordingly, we reject defendant's cross appeal and affirm the district court's decision to award fees. 35