Court Opinion

ID: 9851484
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:13:43.011241+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:58.455382
License: Public Domain

BISTLINE, Justice,
dissenting.
The opinions issued in this case will not be monuments of Idaho jurisprudence. No great law is being made this day. Unfortunately, it could be otherwise if the Court’s membership was more in tune with principles of fair-play and justice — which are the main ingredients which cause courts sitting in equity to do equity.
Synopsizing the history portrayed in the majority opinion, here is the first half of the story. The plaintiff in this action became the owner of an undeveloped lot in Warm Springs Hollow. The Idaho First National Bank at that time owned (by foreclosure on the developer) 24 undeveloped lots and all of the Warm Springs Hollow Homeowners Association’s common areas. The Bank denied the Association’s request to pay the assessments on its 24 undeveloped lots, although it had paid, and the Association accepted, $17,000 in full settlement on its partially developed lots.
The plaintiff in this action was of the firm view that the bank should be brought to heel. His attempts to convince the Association officialdom to pursue the Bank were turned away. The Association officialdom gave two reasons for their reluctance, neither of which consisted of any admission that it might not be politic to sue a bank. He went so far in his efforts as to commence an action against the Association officialdom, the purpose of which was to compel it to take action, bringing his action on behalf of himself and other members.
The Association, while it would not take on the bank, was willing to fight off the plaintiff. The plaintiff had hired a lawyer, and was well-advised in the premises as to the likelihood of successful litigation against the Bank.
At this juncture, that of standing off the plaintiff in his quest to obtain for the Association that which the Bank withheld from it, a strange wind blew in with good news for the Association. Guess what? The Bank was believed about ready to sell its undeveloped lots to a promoter or developer. What an opportunity to use coercive measures against the bank! The Association, now fully responsive to the validity of the plaintiff’s legal contentions, did not hesitate to decide that, after all, legal action against the Bank was not such an awful course to follow. Anyone knows that the filing of a lawsuit together with *8the filing of a lis pendens can often produce remarkably swift results.
Alas, the Association’s attorney was not available to get an action filed right now. No other attorney being at hand who was knowledgable concerning the filing of the exact action against the Bank, the Association did not hesitate to ask its erstwhile antagonist, plaintiff, for the use of his knowledgable attorney’s services. Here was an attorney who knew the territory, and could go into action immediately. One small, but not insignificant problem, he was on retainer with plaintiff.
Was plaintiff a dog-in-the-manger? Not at all. He quickly gave his consent to his attorney now taking on the vulnerable Bank on behalf of an avaricious association which had the smell of bank money in its nostrils. The end of the first part of the story. Just great for the Association. And, what is more, the plaintiff’s view that the Bank had all the time been liable were fully vindicated. If not so, then the Association was guilty of extracting money from the Bank to which it was not entitled.
Meanwhile, the plaintiff was not rewarded one whit, and fell onto hard times — “arrears in his assessments.” This would not do at all, and the Association did not hesitate to take him into court, thereby turning him into a man who will pay his assessments, or else.
Not taking too kindly at being kicked around thusly, the plaintiff decided that enough is enough, and came after the Association. Among other claims, he contended that “the Association was unjustly enriched by the use of his attorney in that he had paid the attorney to prepare for the litigation and the Association got the benefit of the (his) attorney’s preparation.” (Majority Op. p. 5, 752 P.2d p. 607).
The majority opinion well points out the quick benefit which flowed to the Association from the filing of a lawsuit and a lis pendens. To the credit of the majority, it does pay rote lip service to the theory of unjust enrichment, i.e., that “the defendant has received a benefit which would be inequitable to retain without at least compensating the plaintiff to the extent that retention is unjust.”
If the majority said nothing more, and simply affirmed, the dispensation of inequitable justice would be merely deplorable. But where the majority, four legally trained and experienced minds deign to use as the proferred excuse for their actions, “Here, the appellant incurred the legal expenses paid to Barchas on his own behalf without the approval, consent, or ratification of the Association,” I hang my head in shame. More shame that a court supposedly versed in high-sounding principles of equity, also wants the Association to continue mulcting the plaintiff in' assessed attorney fees.
I cannot refrain from attaching the report of a more equitable tale from faraway, barbaric North Idaho, of justice administered back in the olden days when Idaho judges had a better concept of justice. Appendix A, attached. I exit from this appellate review with this passing thought: Nemo debet locupletari ex aliena jactura, which as applied by the majority in this case translates to “No good deed shall go unpunished.”
Who was the more entitled to the benefit of the equitable doctrine which was applied in Lynch v. Pierce and given recognition in this case? Was it the owner of an idle $300 rusting diesel tank, or the plaintiff here who allowed the Association the fruits of his attorney’s ability and labor?
APPENDIX A
IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE FIRST JUDICIAL DISTRICT OF THE STATE OF IDAHO, IN AND FOR THE COUNTY OF LOUNDARY
PAT LYNCH, c/b/a Lynch Construction Company, Plaintiff, v. WALLY PIERCE, Defendant.
No. 3525
MEMORANDUM DECISION
Plaintiff construction company owned a 4,000 gallon diesel fuel tank that was *9stored on their property at the time of the forest fire season during August of 1967. This tank was purchased by plaintiff for some $300.00 and similar tanks could be purchased in the Spokane area for about $400.00 to $500.00.
While the owners and managers of the plaintiff construction company were gone from the area, the foreman, who had been left in charge, when approached by defendant permitted him to go ahead and use the tank, but there was no agreement as to the compensation due plaintiff.
Defendant took the tank, cut a hole in one end of the tank and placed a pipe therein to permit him to use the tank as a water tank for sprinkling the roads in the fire area. About August 29th plaintiff was hired by the United States Forest Service, at the rate of $15.25 per hour, to use the aforesaid tank, a White truck tractor, and sprinkling equipment to sprinkle the water on certain roads in the fire area. Between August 29th and September 10, 1967 defendant used the truck and tank and supplied a driver and all gasoline, oil and maintenance for a period of 284 hours, and was paid therefor at the rate of $15.25 per hour. When plaintiff’s managers and owners returned, they advised defendant to return the tank to the storage area or pay them $3.50 an hour for the use of the tank.
Defendant immediately returned the tank to the storage area and purchased his own tank to continue with the sprinkling operation.
Plaintiff’s witnesses testified that $3.25 an hour was a reasonable charge for the use of the tank, considering the fact that this was during a forest fire season, that water sprinkler tanks were in dire need, and the Forest Service was paying $15.25 an hour for a tank mounted on a truck with the driver and gasoline, in other words, plaintiff’s estimate of value was based upon the use to which the tank was being put at the time it was used by the defendant.
Defendant contends that there was no shortage of tanks, either in the Bonners Ferry area or in Spokane, and that if he was ingenious enough to put the tank on a truck and hire it out for $15.25 an hour, that he should not be forced to pay a fourth of that to the plaintiffs for the use of the tank. However, defendant offered no estimate of the reasonable value of the use of the tank during the period of time that he had it.
“It is a general principle underlying various legal doctrines and remedies that one person should not be permitted unjustly to enrich himself at the expense of another, but should be required to make restitution of or for property or benefits received, retained or appropriated where it is just and equitable that such restitution be made and where such action involves no violation or frustration of the law or opposition to public policy, either directly or indirectly.” ... “It is not essential in order to create the obligation tomake restitution for benefits, that the recipient should himself have been guilty of any tortious conduct or fault.”
46 Am.Jur.P. 99
“..., the terms restitution and unjust enrichment are the modern designation for the older doctrine of quasi contracts____ Quasi contracts are not contracts but are obligations created by the law when money or property has been placed in one person’s possession under such circumstances that in equity and good conscience he ought not to retain it. (Citations). Thus the substance of an action for unjust enrichment lies in a promise implied by law that one will render to the person entitled thereto that which in equity and good conscience belongs to the latter ... (Citations).” “Going to the restatement law of restitution, we find general statements supporting the instant judgment. Sec. 1, ‘A person who has been unjustly enriched at the expense of another is required to make restitution to the other.’ Comment c. under the above, implies that where a person receives a benefit from another he is liable to pay therefor if the circumstances of its receipt or retention are such that as between the two it is unjust for him to retain it ...” Duffy v. Scott, 235 (Wis.) 142, 292 N.W. 273 [1940],
*10Hixon v. Allphin, 76 Idaho 327 [281 P.2d 1042 (1955)]
It is clear in this instance that defendant was lawfully in possession of the tank as having obtained permission from the managing agent of the plaintiffs, but that no agreement for compensation or lack of compensation had been reached. Under these circumstances it is inequitable for the defendant to retain the benefits of the property belonging to the plaintiff without paying a just compensation therefor, and the court accepts the figure of $3.25 per hour for a period of 284 hours as a reasonable compensation for the use of the tank, under the circumstances as existed at that time, and considering the benefits received by the defendant for the use of the tank.
The court therefore finds that the defendant is indebted to the plaintiff in the sum of $923.00, plus costs of the action.
Would the attorney for the plaintiff prepare appropriate Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law and Judgment in accordance with this opinion.
Dated this 25th day of September, 1968. /s/James G. Towles District Judge