Court Opinion

ID: 9541898
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:29:26.599322+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:05:08.759584
License: Public Domain

ON DENIAL OF PETITION FOR REHEARING
BISTLINE, Acting Judge.
The plaintiff, Gary Olsen, in petitioning this Court for a rehearing, has suggested that we substituted our findings for those utilized by the trial court, and also asserts error in our determination that the surrender by operation of law occurred on May 19, 1981.
As to our upholding the trial court’s determination that a surrender by operation of law did occur, the plaintiff asserts that both courts “have unfairly seized upon the bare language of ‘forfeiture,’ ‘terminate,’ ‘surrender,’ and ‘re-establish’ found in Olsen’s communications to his tenants.We pause only long *800enough to note that the first three of those words are words of art, the meaning of which in the profession is clearly recognized, and the word “re-establish” is a word of common usage and understanding, found in most, if not all, English dictionaries. In the context as used by plaintiff, it obviously conveyed the message that a relationship between the parties might by created anew, should the lessees be able to timely comply with the terms and conditions decreed by the plaintiff — some of which included reimbursing him for expenditures which he unilaterally made after retaking possession.
We have again reviewed the written decision of the trial court and compared it to our September 1985 opinion. Our opinion relies upon the same facts and circumstances delineated by the trial court. Whereas the trial court’s written decision states:
From the foregoing facts the Court concludes that the effective date of surrender of the premises to the plaintiff was on August 29, 1981. This conclusion is based primarily on the factual background of the exclusive operation of the premises by the plaintiff and his agents inconsistent thereto with any theory other than his actions were for his own account. Furthermore, prior correspondence from plaintiff’s attorney to the defendants had indicated that plaintiff would leave the matter open to defendants until that date; hence, based upon that expression of intention and the acts of the plaintiff subsequent thereto this Court concludes that August 29, 1981, was the effective date of the surrender. R., p. Ill (emphasis added),
we reached the conclusion that the effective date of the surrender was on May 19, rather than on August 29. It is axiomatic and unneedful of citation that an appellate court is not bound by a lower court’s conclusions, but can and will draw its own conclusions by affixing applicable law to the facts which were resolved by the trial court, or, as here, were undisputed. We are pointed to no error in the conclusion which we earlier drew.
Perceiving that there was a clerical error in the awarding of costs in our September opinion, we strike the award of costs which was made to the plaintiff.
Costs on appeal including proceedings on rehearing, are awarded to the parties who were defendants below and respondents and cross-appellants in this Court.
OLIVER, Acting J., concurs.
BAKES, Acting C.J., adheres to the views expressed in his earlier opinion.