Tag: amended pleadings

Anticipatory Repudiation: Illinois Court Examines Doctrine in Real Estate Distpute

The home sellers’ failure to plead the buyers’ anticipatory repudiation of a real estate contract spelled defeat in Kelly v. Orrico, 2014 IL App (2d)  130002, a recent Second District case. 

In Kelly, the plaintiffs and defendants – who happened to be friends and neighbors (they lived on the same street) – entered into a real estate contract for plaintiffs to sell their house to the defendants for $1.2M.  

When defendants couldn’t sell their home, plaintiffs contracted with another buyer.  That buyer defaulted and plaintiffs eventually sold the house for $200,000 less than the contract price with the defendants.

Plaintiff sued defendants for breach of the real estate sales contract seeking to recover the $200,000 difference between the contract price with defendants ($1.2M) and the sales price to the new buyer ($1M). 

After a bench trial, the court ruled that the defendants anticipatorily repudiated the real estate sales contract and awarded plaintiffs damages of $150,000 (the $200K difference in the underlying contract price and the sales price to the new buyer minus the $50,000 earnest money plaintiffs kept after the first buyer defaulted).  Defendants appealed.

Held: Reversed.

Rules/Reasoning:

Anticipatory repudiation denotes a “party’s clear manifestation of its intent not to perform under a contract.”  The party claiming anticipatory repudiation must show more than an “ambiguous implication” of nonperformance. He has to demonstrate the other party made it very clear he won’t perform.  (¶¶ 29-30).

Here, plaintiffs didn’t plead anticipatory repudiation; they only alleged breach of contract.  This was a mistake because any proof at trial that the defendants repudiated the contract didn’t help the plaintiffs since an anticipatory repudiation claim was absent from the complaint. 

While Code Section 2-616(c) allows a party to amend pleadings at any time (even after judgment) to conform the pleadings to the proofs, plaintiff never filed a motion to amend their complaint to allege anticipatory repudiation.

The plaintiffs didn’t substantively prove anticipatory repudiation either.  The Court described anticipatory repudiation as a doctrine not to be taken lightly and where one repudiates a contract – by clearly indicating that he won’t perform – the other party to the contract is excused from performing or he may perform and seek damages for breach. 

The Court found that the defendants actions indicated, at most, ambivalence as to whether they would buy plaintiffs’ house. 

The plaintiffs offered no proof at trial that defendants tried to terminate the contract or indicated they wouldn’t proceed to closing.  Significantly, the Court found that defendants’ failure to respond to plaintiffs’ attorney’s letter declaring defendants in default didn’t constitute a clear manifestation of intent not to buy plaintiffs’ home.  (¶30).

Take-aways:

This case illustrates anticipatory repudiation’s strict pleading and proof elements.

The case’s procedural lesson here is clear: a litigant should move to amend his pleadings when the proofs at trial don’t match up.  Here, it wouldn’t have made a difference though.  The Court found defendants’ actions weren’t definite enough to rise to the level of a clear-cut intention not to proceed to closing.

Basketball Deity Can Add Additional Plaintiff in Publicity Suit Versus Jewel Food Stores – IL ND (the ‘Kriss Kross Will Make You…Jump’ Post(??)

There’s No Way(!) I’m going to simply pull-and-post just any Google Image of His Airness and hope no one sees it (or, more accurately, takes it seriously enough to engage in some copyright saber-rattling about it).  Not after Michael Jordan is fresh off his nearly $9M Federal jury verdict in a publicity suit against erstwhile Chicago grocer Dominick’s and its parent company.  I didn’t even know he filed a companion suit – this one against Jewel Food Stores – another iconic Midwest grocery brand – pressing similar publicity claims against the chain for using his image without his permission.  Now I do.

In fact, just a couple days before that Friday night Federal jury verdict in the Dominick’s suit, Jordan successfully moved to add his loan-out company1, Jump 23, Inc. as a party plaintiff in his Jewel suit.  The Jewel case, like its Dominick’s case counterpart, stems from Jewel’s use of Jordan’s likeness in an ad congratulating him on his 2009 hoops Hall of Fame induction.

In granting Jordan’s motion to add the Jump 23 entity, the court in Jordan v. Jewel Food Stores, Inc., 2015 WL 4978700 (N.D.Ill. 2015), quite naturally, drilled down to the bedrock principles governing amendments to pleadings in Federal court as expressed in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

In the Federal scheme, Rule 15 controls pleading amendments and freely allows amendments to pleadings “when justice so requires.”  Rule 15(c)(1)(C) governs where an amended claim is time-barred (filed after the statute of limitations expires) and seeks to add a new claim or a new party.  If the party or claim to be added stems from the same transaction as the earlier pleading, the amended pleading will “relate back” to the date of the timely filed claim.

Assuming an amended claim arises out of the same conduct, transaction or occurrence as the earlier (and timely) claim, the (normally) time-barred claim will be deemed timely as long as the party to be brought in by the amendment (1) received such notice of the action that it will not be prejudiced in defending the suit on the merits; and (2) knew or should have known that the action would have been brought against it, but for a mistake concerning the proper party’s identity.

While Rule 15 only speaks to bringing in additional defendants, it’s rationale extends to situations where a party seeks to add a new plaintiff.  Delay alone in adding a party (either plaintiff or defendant) usually isn’t enough to deny a motion to amend to add a new party. Instead, the party opposing amendment (here, Jewel) must show prejudice resulting from the joined party.  Prejudice here means something akin to lost evidence, missing witnesses or a compromised defense caused by the delay.

In this case, the court found there was no question that the Jump 23 entity was aligned with Jordan’s interests and its publicity claim was based on the same conduct underlying Jordan’s.  It also found there was no prejudice to Jewel in allowing Jump 23 to be added as co-plaintiff.  The court noted that Jump 23’s addition to the suit didn’t change the facts and issues in the case and didn’t raise the specter of increased liability for Jewel.  In addition, the court stressed that Jewel is entitled to use the written discovery obtained in the Dominick’s case.  As a result, Jewel won’t be exposed to burdensome additional discovery by allowing the addition of Jump 23 as plaintiff.

Take-away:

This case provides a good summary of Rule 15 amendment elements in the less typical setting of a party seeking to add a plaintiff as a party to a lawsuit.  The lesson for defendants is clear: delay alone isn’t severe enough to deny a plaintiff’s attempt to add a party.  The defendant (or person opposing amendment) must show tangible prejudice in the form of lost evidence, missing witnesses or that its ability to defend the action is weakened by the additional parties’ presence in the suit.

Jordan versus Jewel is slated for trial in December 2015.  I’m interested to see how the multi-million dollar Dominick’s verdict will impact pre-trial settlement talks in the Jewel case.  I would think Jordan has some serious bargaining leverage to exact a hefty settlement from Jewel.  More will be revealed.

  1. Loan-out company definition (see http://www.abspayroll.net/payroll101-loan-out-companies.html)