Court Opinion

ID: 9952609
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-20 14:04:44.578624+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:41:23.506814
License: Public Domain

Third District Court of Appeal
                                  State of Florida

                           Opinion filed March 20, 2024.
          Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.

                               ________________

                                No. 3D22-1736
                          Lower Tribunal No. 15-14374
                             ________________

                 Webjet Linhas Aereas S.A., etc., et al.,
                                    Appellants,

                                        vs.

                     ZGA Aircraft Leasing, Inc., etc.,
                                     Appellee.

    An Appeal from the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Valerie R.
Manno Schurr, Judge.

      King & Spalding LLP, and W. Randall Bassett and Drew T. Bell,
(Austin, TX), for appellants.

        No appearance, for appellee.

Before LOGUE, C.J.,1 and SCALES, and MILLER, JJ.

        SCALES, J.

1
    Chief Judge Logue did not participate in oral argument.
        Appellants GOL Linhas Aereas, S.A. (“GOL”) and Webjet Linhas

Aereas, S.A. (“Webjet”) (together, “Appellants”), the defendants below,

appeal the trial court’s September 7, 2022 order denying their motion seeking

attorneys’ fees pursuant to their June 2021 proposal for settlement. See §

768.79, Fla. Stat. (2021). We reverse the challenged order because appellee

ZGA Aircraft Leasing, Inc.’s (“ZGA”) complaint alleged that offeror GOL’s

liability was merely constructive and, therefore, the joint proposal was not

required to state the amounts attributable to each appellant offeror. See Fla.

R. Civ. P. 1.442(c).

   I.     RELEVANT FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

        ZGA is a closely held Brazilian corporation owned by Roberto Zotti.

GOL is a low-cost, economy airline based in Brazil. In 2010, GOL acquired

Webjet, another low-cost Brazilian airline. All of Webjet’s assets and services

were subsequently incorporated into GOL, which controls the corporate

entity.

        In 2013, ZGA approached GOL seeking to buy six Boeing 737-300

aircraft that GOL had acquired when it purchased Webjet. ZGA sent Webjet

a signed, proposed purchase agreement naming Webjet as seller and ZGA

as purchaser. Webjet requested that additional conditions had to be agreed

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upon before finalizing any sale of the aircraft. Allegedly, ZGA never agreed

to these additional terms, and by the following year the negotiations failed.

Ultimately, Appellants sold the aircraft to another party.

      In 2015, ZGA filed suit against Appellants in Miami-Dade County

Circuit Court, seeking to have the trial court determine that the purchase

agreement was valid and enforceable (Count I), alleging breach of the

purchase agreement for failure to deliver the aircraft (Count II), and seeking

to impose alter ego liability upon GOL and to pierce GOL’s corporate veil

(Count III).

      In June 2021, pursuant to Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.442 and

section 768.79 of the Florida Statutes, Appellants served ZGA with a

proposal for settlement in the amount of $75,000.00, in complete settlement

of all claims made by ZGA against Webjet. ZGA did not respond within thirty

days of service of the proposal, and as a result it was deemed rejected under

rule 1.442(f)(1).

      The case went to a non-jury trial in November 2021. The trial court

entered an order and final judgment ruling in Appellants’ favor, and this Court

affirmed on appeal. See ZGA Aircraft Leasing, Inc. v. Webjet Linhas Aereas,

S.A., 366 So. 3d 1164 (Fla. 3d DCA 2023).

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          Following the final judgment, Appellants filed a timely motion for

attorney’s fees and costs pursuant to rule 1.442 and section 768.79. ZGA

did not respond. At the hearing on Appellants’ motion for attorney’s fees,

ZGA argued that the proposal for settlement was invalid because it was

made by two different parties – GOL and Webjet – and was directed to one

party, ZGA, and it did not apportion the offer amount between GOL and

Webjet. The trial court granted Appellants prevailing party costs, and

deferred the motion for attorney’s fees as a result of ZGA’s objections.

          At the subsequent fee hearing, the trial court determined that

Appellants’ proposal for settlement did not strictly comply with the

requirements of rule 1.442 because it was a joint proposal that failed to

apportion the amount offered between GOL and Webjet. On September 7,

2022, the trial court entered an order denying Appellants’ motion for

attorney’s fees. Appellants timely appealed this September 7, 2022 order.

    II.     ANALYSIS2

2
  We review de novo the eligibility of a party to receive attorney’s fees and
costs pursuant to the statute governing an offer of judgment (section 768.79)
and the rule governing proposals for settlement (rule 1.442). See Atl. Civil,
Inc. v. Swift, 271 So. 3d 21, 24 (Fla. 3d DCA 2018). Both section 768.79 and
rule 1.442 must be strictly construed because they are “in derogation of the
common law rule that each party is responsible for its own fees.” Pratt v.
Weiss, 161 So. 3d 1268, 1271 (Fla. 2015).

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      The issue in this case is whether the trial court erred by determining

that Appellants’ June 2021 proposal for settlement was invalid because it

failed to apportion the settlement amount between the two offerors as

required by the procedural rule governing joint proposals. While we agree

with the trial court that Appellants’ proposal was a “joint proposal” governed

by rule 1.442(c)(3), our review of ZGA’s operative complaint reveals that

ZGA alleged that offeror GOL was merely constructively liable for ZGA’s

alleged damages, therefore bringing Appellants’ joint proposal within rule

1.442(c)(4)’s exception to rule 1.442(c)(3)’s attribution requirement.

   A. Appellants’ proposal for settlement was a joint proposal for purposes
      of rule 1.442(c)(3)

      Rule 1.442(c)(3) governs joint proposals for settlement and reads, in

its entirety, as follows: “A proposal may be made by or to any party or parties

and by or to any combination of parties properly identified in the proposal. A

joint proposal shall state the amount and terms attributable to each party.”

(Emphasis added). Here, the opening paragraph of Appellants’ proposal for

settlement plainly identified the offerors as both Webjet and GOL, the two

named defendants in ZGA’s complaint. Paragraph 1 of Appellants’ proposal

stated as follows: “1. PARTIES MAKING PROPOSAL: Defendants WEBJET

LINHAS AEREAS S.A. and GOL LINHAS AEREAS INTELIGENTES S.A.

(“Defendants”).” Further, paragraph 4 of Appellants’ proposal provided: “4.

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TOTAL AMOUNT OF PROPOSAL: Defendants offer the pay Plaintiff the

total sum of Seventy-Five Thousand and 00/100 Dollars ($75,000.00) in

complete settlement of all claims made by Plaintiff against Webjet in this

action.” (Emphasis in italics added).

      Appellants’ proposal for settlement was plainly a joint proposal. It

clearly and unambiguously identified that the proposal was being made by

both Webjet and GOL, the two defendants named in ZGA’s lawsuit.

   B. Because of rule 1.442(c)(4)’s exception, rule 1.442(c)(3)’s
      apportionment requirement did not apply to Appellants’ joint proposal
      for settlement

      Because Appellants’ proposal for settlement was plainly a joint

proposal, rule 1.442(c)(3) required the proposal to “state the amount and

terms attributable to each party.” But rule 1.442(c)(3)’s apportionment

requirement is not applicable “when a party is alleged to be solely vicariously,

constructively, derivatively, or technically liable, whether by operation of law

or by contract[.]” Fla. R. Civ. P. 1.442(c)(4) (emphasis added). As the

allegations inform the court’s inquiry in this regard, we look to the pleadings

to determine whether rule 1.442(c)(4) is applicable to relieve joint proposal

offerors of rule 1.442(c)(3)’s apportionment requirement. See Peltz v. Tr.

Hosp. Int’l, LLC, 242 So. 3d 518, 520 (Fla. 3d DCA 2018).

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      The operative complaint in this case was ZGA’s June 2015 verified

complaint in which ZGA asserted that Webjet breached an October 17, 2013,

written purchase agreement between ZGA and Webjet. ZGA’s complaint

contained a host of allegations that sought to hold GOL, a non-party to the

purchase agreement, constructively liable for Webjet’s alleged breach of the

purchase agreement. Indeed, paragraph 33 of ZGA’s complaint alleged that

GOL and Webjet were “one-and-the-same,” that GOL was an “alter ego” of

Webjet, and that GOL “dominat[ed] and control[ed]” Webjet. Further, the

entirety of Count III of ZGA’s complaint sought to pierce GOL’s corporate veil

to hold GOL liable for Webjet’s alleged breach of the purchase agreement.

ZGA did not allege, nor could it, that GOL breached the contract because

ZGA had no contract with GOL. In sum, ZGA alleged that GOL was

constructively, rather than directly, liable for Webjet’s breach of contract.

      We view these as the type of allegations that, pursuant to rule

1.442(c)(4),   render    rule   1.442(c)(3)’s    apportionment     requirement

inapplicable to Appellants’ joint proposal. When, as here, a plaintiff alleges

that one of the two defendants being sued is solely constructively liable for

damages caused by the other named defendant’s conduct, apportioning a

joint proposal’s settlement offer between the two offerors is entirely

unnecessary and serves no meaningful purpose. As recognized by rule

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1.442(c)(4)’s exception to rule 1.442(c)(3)’s apportionment requirement, in

such circumstances, it matters not to the offeree how much of the total offer,

if accepted by the offeree, is being paid by each offeror.

   III.     CONCLUSION

          While the trial court correctly characterized appellants’ proposal for

settlement as a “joint proposal” governed by rule 1.442(c)(3), that rule’s

apportionment requirement was rendered inapplicable by virtue of rule

1.442(c)(4), because ZGA’s operative complaint alleged that offeror GOL

was merely constructively liable for its co-offeror’s (Webjet) alleged breach

of the purchase agreement. Appellants’ joint proposal, therefore, complied

with rule 1.442 and the trial court should have determined it was valid.

          Reversed and remanded.

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