Keith D. Harper v. S&H Leasing LLC

Indiana Supreme Court·Decided April 9, 2026·No. 26S-PL-00111·Published·Justice Slaughter

Opinion

IN THE

Indiana Supreme Court FILED

Supreme Court Case No. 26S-PL-111 Apr 09 2026, 9:31 am

CLERK

Keith D. Harper, Indiana Supreme Court Court of Appeals

and Tax Court

Appellant-Defendant,

–v–

S&H Leasing, LLC; K&K Real Estate Holdings, LLC; Thomas Hagen; Brian Brisco; and Jeremy Noetzel, Appellees-Plaintiffs.

Argued: December 4, 2025 | Decided: April 9, 2026

Appeal from the Elkhart Superior Court No. 20D02-2108-PL-200

The Honorable Stephen R. Bowers, Judge

On Petition to Transfer from the Indiana Court of Appeals No. 24A-PL-1606

Opinion by Justice Slaughter Chief Justice Rush, and Justices Massa, Goff, and Molter concur.

Slaughter, Justice.

The Crime Victim’s Relief Act allows trial courts to award treble damages to victims of certain criminal offenses in a civil claim against the wrongdoer. To prevail under the CVRA, a plaintiff must prove the defendant committed all elements of the criminal offense. Here, the parties dispute whether Defendant committed criminal conversion of money. Under the plain text of the criminal-conversion statute, all agree he did. But, for purposes of the CVRA, Defendant argues there is an extra element unique to conversion cases—disputed funds must be “special chattel”, i.e., a determinate sum entrusted to the defendant for a certain purpose.

We hold that money need not be “special chattel” for criminal conversion or, what follows, for civil claims under the CVRA. The definition of a crime is limited to its statutory elements. The special-chattel requirement is not an element of the criminal-conversion statute. Thus, we affirm the trial court’s judgment awarding treble damages and remand with instructions .

I

A

In 2008 and 2009, Keith Harper organized two companies with his thenwife , Kathryn Summers: S&H Leasing, LLC, which buys and sells used vehicles to consumers; and K&K Real Estate Holdings, LLC, which owns S&H’s real estate. Harper hired Brian Brisco in 2014 and Thomas Hagen in 2015; both helped expand S&H into a large and profitable retail operation.

Harper and Summers rewarded S&H’s success by gifting Hagen five shares and Brisco three shares of S&H. In 2017, Hagen and Brisco bought additional shares of both LLCs, after which Harper owned 34% of the LLCs; Hagen and Brisco each owned 33%; and Summers no longer owned any shares. Under the operating agreements, Harper remained the sole manager of both LLCs and had “full and complete power and authority to make all decisions and to take all actions incident to the management and conduct of the [LLCs’] business and affairs”.

In 2020, Harper sold 10% of his ownership in the LLCs to Jeremy Noetzel , another employee of S&H and a certified public accountant who prepared tax returns for the two LLCs. Beginning in 2021, the relationship between Harper, on one hand, and Hagen, Brisco, and Noetzel, on the other, fractured. Harper became “more and more volatile”. He came to work intoxicated , damaged company property, and was confrontational with employees . Hagen, Brisco, and Noetzel met with Harper and voted to amend the LLCs’ operating agreements, remove Harper as a manager, force him to sell his shares in the LLCs, and terminate his employment with S&H. Harper refused to sell his shares and did not attend the closing for the sale of his ownership interests.

In August 2021, Hagen, Brisco, Noetzel, and the LLCs sued Harper in the Elkhart Superior Court, alleging that he breached the LLCs’ operating agreements, and asking the court to issue a declaratory judgment that the operating agreements required Harper to sell his remaining 24% ownership interest to Hagen, Brisco, and Noetzel.

B

During discovery, Plaintiffs uncovered a real-estate transaction from January 2017 between K&K and RBS Properties, LLC, a third-party property management company. In the transaction, Harper leveraged K&K’s real-estate holdings to borrow $55,000 from RBS to buy a piece of real estate . At the same time, he mortgaged K&K’s assets to borrow an additional $275,000 in cash from RBS. Hagen and Brisco were unaware of the cash loan, though they were both members of K&K at the time. After transfer fees, Harper transferred the cash loan, amounting to $273,787, to K&K’s bank account. Harper then wrote two checks: $173,787 to his personal home-equity line of credit with PNC Bank and $100,000 to S&H Leasing to an account named “Accounts Payable K&K”. Then, throughout 2017, Harper transferred the $100,000 for his personal use and benefit, and he never repaid K&K the $273,787.

Once Plaintiffs discovered the cash loan with RBS, as well as Harper’s transfer of the funds to his personal line of credit, they amended their complaint. Plaintiffs brought additional claims of breach of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment, fraud, and theft. Plaintiffs alleged that Harper stole

these funds for his personal use, and that he never notified Plaintiffs of the loan and never properly recorded the loan in the LLCs’ books. S&H also sought treble damages and attorneys’ fees under the CVRA.

After a two-day bench trial, the trial court issued its findings of fact and conclusions of law. The court found for Plaintiffs on their claims under the CVRA, breach of fiduciary duty, and unjust enrichment. It noted that Harper used the $273,787 “to pay off personal debts, including substantial gambling debts that caused his personal line of credit at PNC to be either maxed out or nearly so”. Because Harper “used company assets to pay his personal obligations, without informing the other members of the LLCs and without obtaining proper authorization”, he breached his fiduciary duty as manager of the LLCs. The court “conservatively characterize[d] Harper’s action as a Criminal Conversion”, which is sufficient for treble damages under the CVRA. The court entered judgment against Harper for $821,361, which represented “treble damages for the conversion of $273,787,” as well as costs and attorneys’ fees.

Harper appealed the trial court’s order, and our court of appeals affirmed in part and reversed in part in a precedential opinion. Harper v. S&H Leasing, LLC, et al., 260 N.E.3d 960 (Ind. Ct. App. 2025). A majority of the panel was “obligated to agree” with Harper that he did not commit conversion because Harper commingled the $273,787 with his own money, so the funds were not a separately identifiable chattel sufficient for conversion. Id. at 969. But the majority concluded that Harper committed theft—another CVRA-eligible offense—which does not require separately identifiable chattel, so it affirmed the trial court’s judgment awarding treble damages under the CVRA. Id. at 970.

Judge Vaidik concurred in part and in the judgment, disagreeing with the majority only on Plaintiffs’ CVRA claim. She agreed with the trial court that Harper’s moving the K&K loan proceeds to his personal line of credit “satisfie[d] the statutory elements of criminal conversion”, and she would eliminate the “segregation” requirement for conversion claims involving money. Id. at 976 (Vaidik, J., concurring). She also found the panel’s conclusion that Harper committed theft, but not conversion, suspect because conversion is a lesser-included offense of theft. Id. at 977.

Harper sought transfer, which we grant today, ___ N.E.3d ___ (Ind. 2026), thus vacating the appellate opinion, Ind. Appellate Rule 58(A). We address only the CVRA claim and summarily affirm the court of appeals on the claims of breach of fiduciary duty and unjust enrichment. We note that our appellate court previously held that the existence of a purchase agreement did not necessarily preclude an unjust-enrichment claim. See Coppolillo v. Cort, 947 N.E.2d 994, 998–99 (Ind. Ct. App. 2011). But Plaintiffs did not claim unjust enrichment under this exception, and they did not challenge this claim on transfer to our Court.

II

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