Court Opinion

ID: 9849468
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:40:38.056653+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:59.282981
License: Public Domain

WOLLMAN, Justice
(concurring in part, dissenting in part).
Although I agree with much of what Chief Justice Fosheim says in his dissent, I would agree with the majority opinion to the extent that there may be circumstances under which a supplier is charged with the duty of applying a contractor’s payment to the account incurred for the materials supplied to the owner’s premises. For example, if in the instant case contractor had endorsed owners’ payment check over to supplier, I think all would agree that the proceeds of that check would have had to first be applied to the account balance representing the concrete furnished to owners’ premises. Cf. Crescent Electric Supply Co. v. Employers Mut. Cas. Co., 79 S.D. 18, 107 N.W.2d 252 (1961). In that situation, supplier would be in effect acting as a conduit for the direct payment by owner to supplier. In the case before us, however, the source of the funds represented by contractor’s payment to supplier cannot be so clearly identified. As it developed, owners’ payment to supplier represented a portion of the funds that were on deposit in *359supplier’s bank account at the time the $10,000 check was written to supplier, but I do not agree that the record impels the inference that it must have been manifest to supplier that the $10,000 payment was tendered for the materials incorporated into the project on owners’ farm. Accordingly, I would hold that the trial court erred in ruling that the $10,000 payment must first be applied to the account representing the materials delivered to owners’ farm.
I agree with the majority opinion’s holding on the issue of attorney fees.