Opinion ID: 1937332
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: Corporate Waste

Text: Correctly recognizing that a claim of corporate waste is a derivative claim under Alabama law (see Galbreath v. Scott, 433 So.2d 454, 457 (Ala.1983)), the trial court allocated solely to Corridor Enterprises the entire award for this wrong in the amount of $1,830,400. We do not discern in Robbins's briefs any challenge to this component of the trial court's award. With respect to this award, however, and the award for excessive compensation, Robbins also argues that the trial court's order whereby, according to Robbins, the minority-shareholder estates recover 35.7% of each award directly and will then receive an additional 35.7% of the remainder in the course of the dissolution of the corporation allows a double recovery. (Robbins's brief, p. 46.) Robbins cites no caselaw in that regard and does not otherwise elaborate upon the contention, except to state that a double recovery for the minority-shareholder estates would be the result under our holding in Robbins I. As explained above, we have transferred from the minority-shareholder estates to the corporation all of the damages allocated by the trial court to the minority-shareholder estates resulting from the claims of conversion and the payment of tax penalties, and we have explained why, given that Robbins chooses to characterize the claims of excessive compensation, loss of rental income, and diversion of corporate opportunities as tort claims accruing to the minority-shareholder estates, any error in the allocation of a portion of those damages to the corporation would be error without injury as far as Robbins is concerned. Finally, the damages awarded by the trial court for the remaining claim of corporate waste are assigned exclusively to the corporation. Thus, there remains no field of operation for Robbins double recovery assertion, even if the assertion would otherwise have merit.