Marseilles Homeowners Condominium Ass'n v. Broadmoor, L.L.C.

111 So. 3d 1099, 2012 La.App. 4 Cir. 1233, 2013 WL 745378, 2013 La. App. LEXIS 358
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedFebruary 27, 2013
DocketNo. 2012-CA-1233
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 111 So. 3d 1099 (Marseilles Homeowners Condominium Ass'n v. Broadmoor, L.L.C.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Marseilles Homeowners Condominium Ass'n v. Broadmoor, L.L.C., 111 So. 3d 1099, 2012 La.App. 4 Cir. 1233, 2013 WL 745378, 2013 La. App. LEXIS 358 (La. Ct. App. 2013).

Opinion

PAUL A. BONIN, Judge.

|,Broadmoor, L.L.C., appeals the trial court’s sustaining the objection of libera-tive prescription raised by Pella Corporation, which dismissed with prejudice Broadmoor’s third party demand against Pella. Broadmoor also appeals the grant of summary judgment in favor of J.F. Day and Company, Inc., which dismissed with prejudice Broadmoor’s third party demand against Day,1 as well as the denial of its own motion for partial summary judgment on the issues of indemnity and defense.

Broadmoor was the designer and general contractor of the Marseilles Condominiums, a high-rise residential building on the Lakefront in New Orleans. As part of Broadmoor’s undertaking, it purchased from Day windows manufactured by Pella. Day, Pella’s exclusive distributor in the New Orleans region, entered a contract or purchase order with Broadmoor on May 19, 2000, to supply the Pella-windows. Broadmoor’s purchase order form contained a number | aof express obligations for a seller; among these obligations was the duty to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless Broadmoor even on account of Broadmoor’s negligence or liability incident to or in connection with the purchase and the duty to cause Broadmoor to be named as an additional insured on the seller’s insurance policies. The windows and doors were provided; Pella warranted its windows for ten years.

In late 2002, Tropical Storm Isidore and Hurricane Lili struck the New Orleans area, and the Marseilles Condominiums sustained water intrusion damage. The homeowners association sued Broadmoor on January 15, 2003, and joined Pella and Day on July 8, 2008. Broadmoor filed its third party petition against Pella and Day on July 15, 2008. Broadmoor’s claim against Pella was for the cost of repairs [1103]*1103performed by Broadmoor, which were expended by February 28, 2003. Broadm-oor’s claim against Day was for indemnity and defense.

Pella objected to the lateness of Broadmoor’s filing against it and filed an exception of prescription. Because there was no evidence introduced at the hearing on the exception, the trial judge decided the matter solely upon Broadmoor’s third party petition, determined that the one-year prescriptive period to institute suit had prescribed, and dismissed the claim with prejudice. Applying the manifest error standard of review, we find that the trial judge was not clearly erroneous and affirm the judgment on the exception.

Day’s motion for summary judgment asserted that the indemnity/defense obligations of its purchase order were set forth on the reverse side of the purchase |sorder, that no attention was called to them, that they were not negotiated or bargained for, and that its employee did not have authority to execute the agreement. The trial judge ruled solely upon a determination that the seller’s obligations were on the reverse side of the signature page of the purchase order and no reference was made to them on the signature page, thus rendering these very onerous obligations null. At the same time, the trial judge denied Broadmoor’s motion for partial summary judgment, which sought a ruling on the issue that the provisions were permitted by law and thus enforceable. On our de novo review of the two motions,2 we conclude that there is a genuine issue of material fact which precludes summary judgment in favor of either Broadmoor or Day. The material fact here is dependent upon whether the parties mutually consented to the provisions or conditions and how the offer and acceptance occurred to establish the obligation which Broadmoor seeks to enforce. Thus, we reverse the summary judgment in favor of Day, affirm the denial of Broadm-oor’s summary judgment, and remand to the trial court for further proceedings.

We explain our decision in greater detail below.

I

In this Part we explain why we uphold the trial court’s finding that Broadmoor’s claims against Pella are prescribed.

^Prescription is an objection that may be raised by peremptory exception. See La. C.C.P. art. 927 A(l). At the hearing on the exception, “evidence may be introduced to support or controvert the objection pleaded, when the grounds therefor do not appear from the petition.” La. C.C.P. art. 931. When no evidence is introduced at the hearing, however, the exception must be decided on the facts alleged in the petition, and all the factual allegations are accepted as true. See De-noux v. Vessel Management Services, Inc., 07-2143, pp. 5-6 (La.5/21/08), 983 So.2d 84, 88. Because here no evidence was introduced at the hearing,3 we review the factu[1104]*1104al allegations of Broadmoor’s third party petition, accept them as true, and decide whether the trial judge was clearly wrong in sustaining the exception and dismissing the suit. See La. C.C.P. art. 934.

A

Broadmoor contends on appeal that there are three legal theories under which it can recover from Pella, none of which would result in the third party demand, which was filed in 2008 for loss or damage sustained in 2002, being prescribed. The three theories are (1) that Broadmoor was lulled into inaction by ongoing settlement negotiations with Pella; (2) that Pella is unjustly enriched at Broadmoor’s expense, and (3) that Pella’s ten-year warranty extends the prescriptive period. In the following sections, we contrast the controlling legal principles upon which each of these three theories of recovery are founded with the | ¡-.factual allegations of the third party petition so as to demonstrate that Broadmoor did not carry its burden to prove a longer than one-year prescriptive period.

We first consider the idea that any liberative prescriptive period can be interrupted by the debtor lulling the creditor into inaction. “Prescription is interrupted when one acknowledges the right of the person against whom he had commenced to prescribe.” La. Civil Code art. 3464. “Acknowledgement interruptive of prescription results from any act or fact which contains or implies the admission of the existence of the right.” 5 Civil Law Translations, Baudry-Lacantinerie & Tissier, Prescription, § 529, cited approvingly by Flowers v. U.S. Fidelity & Guaranty Co., 381 So.2d 378, 382 (La.1979). “A tacit acknowledgement occurs when a debtor performs acts of reparation or indemnity, makes an unconditional offer of payment, or lulls the creditor into believing he will not contest liability.” Lima v. Schmidt, 595 So.2d 624, 634 (La.1992). Other criteria that can evidence an acknowledgement include “undisputed liability, repeated and open-ended reassurances of payment, and continuous and frequent contact with the creditor throughout the prescriptive period.” Id.

Our inspection of Broadmoor’s petition reveals no factual allegations which could support application of the interrup-tive effects of Article 3464. Broadmoor alleges that in 2002, at its request, Pella wet-sealed the windows and doors and provided a new ten-year warranty beginning on December 9, 2002. But then its allegations go further and describe how Broadm-oor made repeated attempts to | (¡negotiate a reasonable settlement for the cost of repairs and how, since Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, there were new complaints about the windows and doors.

There is no allegation, factual or otherwise, that Pella lulled Broadmoor into believing it would not contest liability with respect to the cost of the repairs.

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111 So. 3d 1099, 2012 La.App. 4 Cir. 1233, 2013 WL 745378, 2013 La. App. LEXIS 358, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/marseilles-homeowners-condominium-assn-v-broadmoor-llc-lactapp-2013.