Court Opinion

ID: 9480533
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 07:50:48.577766+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:47:44.905472
License: Public Domain

RIPPLE, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I concur in the judgment of the court insofar as it requires a new trial on damages. I respectfully dissent from the court’s failure to require a new trial on liability.
The majority maintains that, under the law of quasi-contract, the recipient need not receive the services “knowingly and voluntarily.” This proposition is correct ... sometimes. For instance, when the recipient could be expected to desire the services and to be willing to pay for them if he knew of his need and of the provision of the services to fill his need, the law of quasi-contract traditionally has provided a remedy. However, the provider of services may not confer them “officiously or gratuitously.” Plastics & Equip. Sales Co. v. DeSoto, 91 Ill.App.3d 1011, 47 Ill.Dec. 487, 493, 415 N.E.2d 492, 498 (Ill.App.Ct.1980). There is no duty to pay for what one does not need or want and would not pay had the bestowal of the “benefit” been known. When this defense is presented, the trier of fact has the duty to determine whether the recipient would have accepted the benefit had he been aware of the provider’s action.
In this case, there is a genuine issue as to whether the services were provided “officiously and gratuitously” — to gain, to paraphrase DeSoto, a business advantage when the recipient did not contemplate a fee and when the provider could not have reasonably expected that the recipient would render compensation. Under these circumstances, I believe that, given the request of the defendant, the jury’s attention should have been focused on this issue by giving the tendered instruction that the benefits must not have been bestowed officiously and gratuitously and must have been accepted knowingly and voluntarily. In a civil case, a party has a right to have the jury properly instructed on its theory of the case as long as there is evidence to support the theory and proper instructions are proposed. See Cameo Convalescent Center, Inc. v. Senn, 738 F.2d 836, 841 (7th Cir.1984), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1106, 105 *746S.Ct. 780, 83 L.Ed.2d 775 (1985); Alloy Int’l Co. v. Hoover-NSK Bearing Co., 635 F.2d 1222, 1226 (7th Cir.1980); Fey v. Walston & Co., 493 F.2d 1036, 1048 (7th Cir.1974). Under the circumstances in this ease, the jury was not adequately instructed and the instructional omission substantially misled the jury with respect to the defendant’s theory of the case. I respectfully dissent.