Opinion ID: 32809
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Evidence at Trial and Review of the District Court's Decision

Text: 17 A bench trial in this case was held on January 14, 2002. At trial, the district court heard testimony and was presented exhibits on behalf of both parties. Maritrend president William Bergeron (Bergeron) testified that Maritrend initially rel[ies] upon the contract that we have with the party, but we always rely on a maritime lien right, as a fallback position. Indeed, in his testimony, Bergeron attests to this belief at least five times. Bergeron also indicated that he thought Serac owned the vessel to which Maritrend was providing stevedoring services. Similarly, Donald Broussard, an employee at Maritrend, testified that the first course of action was always to recover payment from Serac, but if it failed to pay, the company implemented vessel seizure procedures. Finally, Petra Smith, Maritrend's vice president, testified that it was her responsibility to collect delinquent and overdue invoices for stevedoring services and that she only contacted Serac, as opposed to the owners or managers of the SEVILLA WAVE, for payment. 18 Among the exhibits offered at trial were the tariff document and copies of invoices. The tariff document, which was part of the stevedoring services contract, was prepared by Maritrend and placed on file with the Board of Commissioners of the Port of New Orleans. The tariff document does not explicitly state that the SEVILLA WAVE was responsible for stevedoring services, however, as the district court noted, there was no indication in the tariff document or any of the record evidence that Maritrend intended to waive its federal maritime lien. While the invoices were not sent directly to the SEVILLA WAVE, they indicated on their face that the charges contained therein were made FOR THE ACCOUNT OF THE OWNER(S)/AGENT(S) AND/OR CHARTERER(S) OF THE M/V SEVILLA WAVE. There is no language on the invoices that indicates any intent to waive a maritime lien. 19 In holding for Pimpernel, the district court found that the trial testimony established that Maritrend relied solely on the credit of Serac, its customer, for payment of [the stevedoring] services. 28 It rested its decision on the both testimonial and documentary evidence. The principal testimony that the district court relied on was the testimony that Maritrend failed to seek payment from the vessel until several months after non-payment by Serac and that Maritrend expected its customer, Serac, to pay the invoices. The district court also noted that the documentary evidence supported its conclusion because Maritrend's invoices were only addressed and sent to Serac and the tariff document was silent as to whether the vessel was responsible for stevedoring charges. 20 The district court also stated that in light of our decisions in Racal Survey and Equilease, it was bound to rule against Maritrend. It decided this despite the fact that it found Bergeron's testimony that Maritrend always relied on the credit of the vessel as a fallback position when providing stevedoring services was completely credible, 29 and the record evidence did not suggest any reason that Maritrend would relinquish its right to a lien. 30 21 After reviewing the record and applicable case law, we find that there was insufficient evidence adduced at trial to overcome the presumption that Maritrend relied on the credit of the SEVILLA WAVE with respect to the stevedoring services it provided in order to preserve a federal maritime lien. This court has repeatedly indicated the strength of the maritime lien presumption, especially in traditional areas such as stevedoring. 31 Such a strong presumption in favor of a lien places a heavy burden on parties seeking to show a waiver of the lien, forcing them to show that a creditor  deliberately intended to forego the valuable privilege which the law accords and look solely to the owner's personal credit. 32 Neither Equilease Corp. nor Racal Survey weakens this presumption or the burden placed on the party attacking the presumption. 33 22 In applying this standard, this court has found testimonial evidence sufficient to defeat this presumption only in cases where testimony  clearly indicate[d] that [the creditor] did not rely on the credit of the vessels, 34 and there was no other evidence, testimonial or otherwise, supporting the creditor's reliance on the vessel. 35 Furthermore, this court has found evidence such as only invoicing the charterer or a long-standing business relationship with the charterer to be inadequate to show that a creditor relied solely on such charterer. 36 23 Here, neither testimonial nor documentary evidence supports the conclusion that Maritrend solely relied on the credit of Serac. First, although the testimony as a whole shows that Maritrend relied on Serac for payment, it also shows that Maritrend did not rely solely on Serac because it was aware of and generally relied upon its maritime lien rights against the SEVILLA WAVE. Bergeron, who the district court found completely credible, testified that Maritrend always intended to rely on the credit of the vessel as a fallback position. This testimony was further supported by Broussard's statement that Maritrend's practice was to implement ship seizure procedures when invoices for stevedoring services were not timely paid. Therefore, this situation is unlike the cases in Equilease and Racal Survey, where there was clear testimonial evidence by the party seeking to impose a federal maritime lien that it did not rely on the credit of the vessel. 37 24 Second, the documents presented to the district court provide no evidence that Maritrend did not rely on the credit of the vessel. As discussed above, invoicing only the charterer is not dispositive because it only shows that a party attempted to receive the payment from the charterer first, not that it never intended to rely on the credit of the vessel. 38 It is true that the tariff document expressly identifies certain charges to be applied to the vessel and that this list does not include stevedoring services. Again, this only shows that Serac, the charterer, was initially responsible for the stevedoring payments. Nothing in the tariff document shows that Maritrend did not intend to seek payment from the vessel in the event that Serac failed to pay. Therefore, these documents are insufficient to overcome the strong presumption that a federal maritime lien exists when necessaries, such as stevedoring services, are provided to a vessel. 25 In sum, we disagree that our decisions in Equilease and Racal Survey compelled the district court to rule against Maritrend based on these case facts. As the district court observed, Maritrend's resorting to its lien only after Serac defaulted is typical of what is done in the normal course of business. 39 If a supplier of necessaries forfeits his lien on the vessel by conducting his business in accordance with this prevailing practice, then the lien would be available only to suppliers who do not need it. Neither the CIMLA nor our cases interpreting its provisions supports such a result. The implied maritime lien is a security device, and its purpose is to enable a vessel to obtain supplies or repairs necessary to her continued operation by giving a temporary underlying pledge of the vessel which will hold until payment can be made or more formal security given. 40 We would frustrate this purpose if we prohibited enforcement of the lien whenever the supplier's efforts to collect from the person who ordered the necessaries were unsuccessful. 26 Although Maritrend expected Serac to pay for the stevedoring services, and its conduct reflected that reasonable expectation, Bergeron's trial testimony established that Maritrend relied on the credit of the SEVILLA WAVE as a fallback position, which is exactly what the law contemplates. 41 Because Pimpernel offered no evidence to rebut that testimony, and the district court did not find that testimony incredible, it could not meet its burden of proving that Maritrend relied solely on Serac's credit. We therefore hold that the district court's finding that Maritrend waived its lien on the SEVILLA WAVE was erroneous as a matter of law.