Larkins v. St. Paul & Tacoma Lumber Co.

214 P.2d 700, 35 Wash. 2d 711, 1950 Wash. LEXIS 502
CourtWashington Supreme Court
DecidedFebruary 20, 1950
DocketNo. 31191
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 214 P.2d 700 (Larkins v. St. Paul & Tacoma Lumber Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Washington Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Larkins v. St. Paul & Tacoma Lumber Co., 214 P.2d 700, 35 Wash. 2d 711, 1950 Wash. LEXIS 502 (Wash. 1950).

Opinion

Beals, J.

Plaintiffs in-this action, James and Mary Larkins, husband and wife, with their large family of children, moved from Duluth, Minnesota, to Tacoma, during the year 1946. For approximately twenty years prior to this time, Mr. Larkins had been in the employ of a railroad, and, as a side line, had bought and sold scrap metal.

The defendant, St. Paul & Tacoma Lumber Company, a corporation, has for many years been engaged in the logging [712]*712and lumber business in the state of Washington, its principal place of business being in Tacoma'. The corporation conducts extensive operations in and around Ohop post office in Pierce county and elsewhere.

During the month of March, 1947, plaintiff James Larkins (who will be hereinafter referred to as plaintiff or appellant), having been informed that the defendant, in the course of its business, accumulated a considerable quantity of scrap metal, called at defendant’s office for the purpose of offering to buy the scrap. He was referred to Mr. Zoffel, superintendent of operations, and interviewed him at Ohop, with the result that it was agreed that plaintiff could purchase designated scrap metal, paying $3.50 a gross ton therefor.

Plaintiff commenced to operate under this agreement and continued to remove scrap metal until September, 1947, when he was notified that defendant had made other arrangements for the sale of its scrap.

December 17, 1948, plaintiffs filed their complaint in this action, alleging that defendant had for many years been operating in and around Ohop, its plant including a repair shop for servicing locomotives, cranes, steam shovels, and other heavy machinery; that defendant owned a railroad in the vicinity, and, in the course of its operations over the years, had accumulated a large amount of scrap metal.

•The complaint further alleged that, during the month of March, 1947, as the result of negotiations between the parties, the defendant “orally sold, and the plaintiff James Larkins orally purchased said scrap, except for occasional items the defendant could use, for $3.50 per gross ton, to be paid as the scrap was removed”; that, between March 11, 1947, and September 30, 1947, pursuant to this contract, plaintiff removed and paid for over 384 gross tons of scrap; that, during the month of September, 1947, the defendant breached its contract with plaintiff by refusing to allow him to remove scrap from its properties; that, at the time of the breach of the contract, there was a large amount of scrap in and around Ohop; that, .thereafter, defendant sold [713]*713on its own account over one thousand gross tons of scrap which plaintiff was entitled to remove, pursuant to his contract with defendant; that plaintiff had bought the scrap for resale and was able to realize a net profit of eighteen dollars per gross ton oh the resale of the scrap, and that, by defendant’s breach of its contract, plaintiff had suffered damage in the amount of $19,170.

For a second cause of action, plaintiff alleged that defendant still owned, in the vicinity of Ohop, over 203 gross tons of scrap which plaintiff was entitled to remove, under his contract, but which he had been forbidden to remove, to his further damage in the sum of $4,680.50.

Plaintiff demanded judgment against defendant for the amounts referred to above.

By its answer, defendant admitted that, in the course of carrying on its extensive business, some scrap metal had accumulated at its camp No. 1 near Ohop, and that, pursuant to an agreement between the parties, some of the scrap had been sold by defendant to plaintiff. Defendant denied any indebtedness to plaintiff, and, by way of a first affirmative defense, alleged that, by the sale of certain scrap metal to plaintiff, the agreement had been fully accomplished and terminated.

By way of a second affirmative defense, defendant alleged that any such contract as that relied upon by plaintiff in his complaint amounted to a contract for the sale of goods of the value of more than fifty dollars, and was a contract not to be performed within one year, and, therefore, was within the provisions of the statute of frauds and unenforcible unless in writing.

Defendant prayed for dismissal of the action.

By his reply, plaintiff denied the affirmative allegations contained in defendant’s answer.

The case was called for trial before the court, sitting with a jury. At the close of plaintiff’s case, the defendant challenged the sufficiency of the evidence introduced by plaintiff to support a verdict in plaintiff’s favor. The trial court [714]*714sustained this challenge stating that the action would be dismissed.

Plaintiff’s motion for a new trial having been denied, an order was entered denying plaintiff’s motion for a new trial and dismissing the action with prejudice, from which order plaintiff has appealed.

Appellant makes the following assignment of errors:

“ (1) The court erred in dismissing plaintiff’s action.
“(2) The court erred in overruling plaintiff’s motion for new trial.”

As the action was dismissed at the close of appellant’s case, the only evidence contained in the statement of facts consists of the testimony of appellant’s witnesses on direct and cross-examination, and certain exhibits offered by appellant.

Concerning his conversation with respondent’s employee, A. Zoffel, appellant testified:

“Q. What conversation did you have with him? A. Well, I says, ‘Are you Mr. Zoffel?’ He says, ‘Yes, sir.’ I said, ‘Mr. Zoffel,’ I said, ‘You have got a lot of scrap laying around here.’ I says, T am in the market for scrap,’ I says, T would like to buy scrap from you.’ He turned around and smiled and says, ‘Have you ever been in the scrap business?’ I said, ‘Yes, yes, sir,’ so he says, Well, what would you give me a ton?’ I said to him, ‘$3.50.’ Well, he thought it was a good idea, the way he spoke. He said, just like this, ‘And anything we want saved you will save it for us?’ And I said, ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘And anything we don’t want you can scrap it,’ and I said, .‘That is right,’ and that is just the way the bargain went along. The first thing I done, there was a locomotive up on the passing track there. Q. Wait a minute. Have you told all the conversation? Was there any conversation regarding how much scrap there was there? A. Yes, sir. Q. And how long it had been there? A. The conversation—that kind of slipped my mind. I said to him, ‘You have got a good many hundred tons, Mr. Zoffel,’ and he says, ‘You will think so. It will be more than 250,000 ton before you get through,’ and I knew it wasn’t there at Ohop, but it had to come from some place, and the way I looked at it, with all the machinery they had from day to day it was bound to accumulate a lot of it.”

[715]*715Appellant testified that, approximately two weeks after the conversation above quoted, he had another talk with Mr. Zoffel as follows:

“Q. Go ahead. What conversation did you have? A. I seen Mr.

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Larkins v. ST. PAUL & TAC. LBR. CO.
214 P.2d 700 (Washington Supreme Court, 1950)

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Bluebook (online)
214 P.2d 700, 35 Wash. 2d 711, 1950 Wash. LEXIS 502, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/larkins-v-st-paul-tacoma-lumber-co-wash-1950.