Ross Cattle Co. v. Lewis

415 So. 2d 1029, 34 U.C.C. Rep. Serv. (West) 913
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedMay 19, 1982
Docket53094
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 415 So. 2d 1029 (Ross Cattle Co. v. Lewis) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ross Cattle Co. v. Lewis, 415 So. 2d 1029, 34 U.C.C. Rep. Serv. (West) 913 (Mich. 1982).

Opinion

415 So.2d 1029 (1982)

ROSS CATTLE COMPANY
v.
Bryant LEWIS, Cow Palace, Inc., Charles DeLony and Jim Reeves.

No. 53094.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

May 19, 1982.

*1030 Powell & Thrash, Roy D. Powell, Jackson, Reeves & Reeves, Robert S. Reeves, McComb, for appellant.

Mounger, Mounger & Mord, Tylertown, Roach, McMillan, Welch & Ott, T. Patrick Welch, McComb, Keith Starrett, Magnolia, for appellees.

Before SUGG, BROOM and BOWLING, JJ.

BROOM, Justice, for the Court.

Obligations pursuant to the special property interest provision of our Uniform Commercial Code as applied to a written contract whereby defendant/appellee Bryant Lewis was to sell to plaintiff/appellant Ross Cattle Company (Ross herein) four hundred animals (cattle) at $47.50 per hundred weight form the background of this suit appealed from the Circuit Court of Pike County, Mississippi, Judge Joe Pigott, presiding. *1031 Another defendant/appellee is Cow Palace, Inc., an auction sales corporation through which Lewis sold the animals under contract. Individual defendant/appellees are Charles Delony, Cow Palace's president, and its vice president, Jim Reeves. After Lewis sold some of the animals through Cow Palace's auction business for sums in excess of that provided in his contract with Ross, Ross sued for the difference between the contract price and the sum which the animals brought at the sale, plus the average weight of 113 animals unaccounted for under the contract, and $8,000 which Ross paid Lewis when the contract was executed. Directed verdicts were entered by the court exonerating Cow Palace, Delony and Reeves, and the jury found for defendant Lewis. Ross moved for a judgment notwithstanding the jury verdict or in the alternative, an additur, which the court sustained to the extent of $8,000 in which sum the court entered judgment for Ross. On its appeal, Ross argues that: it should have been granted a peremptory instruction below; the jury verdict is not supported by the evidence; and under Mississippi Code Annotated § 75-2-501 (1972), it had a special property interest in the cattle. We reverse.

Date of the contract between defendant Lewis and plaintiff/appellant Ross was February 10, 1978. It provided for delivery of the animals at the sale barn in Brookhaven between May 15 and May 30, 1978. According to the contract (a copy is attached as Appendix "A"), the animals were to be weighed and sorted at the sale barn, giving Ross the option of rejecting up to 5% for crippled, deformed, etc. Subsequent to the contract's execution, point of delivery was changed from Brookhaven to Tylertown. When the contract was signed, Ross paid Lewis $8,000 as a down payment leaving the balance payable upon delivery following weighing of the animals. On Sunday, May 20, 1978, delivery of the animals was discussed by Lewis and Ross's agent. As stated in Lewis's brief, he required payment "before the cattle were moved as he had been told by the agents of Ross Cattle Company that the cattle would be moved out of the State on out of State trucks."

According to Lewis, he had consulted his banker and attorney and they both insisted on payment before the animals were moved.

Appellee Lewis in his brief states that he "offered to take the cattle to the sale barn in Tylertown and have them weighed and wait two days for Ross Cattle Company to get the money together and at that time the cattle could be moved." He states that this quoted testimony is at page 27 in the abstract, but we find no such testimony there. We have taken it upon ourselves to sift through the actual record of Lewis's testimony to see if it shows that he offered to take the animals to the agreed place in Tylertown and hold them there two days in which time Ross could get up the money. The portion of his testimony most nearly matching that quoted above taken from his brief is the following:

Q. Did you ever tell Ross Cattle Company that you were canceling the contract?
A. You mean telling them straight out that I was canceling it?
Q. Yes?
A. Not if they offered to pay for the cattle, they could have got the cattle on Monday. I told them twice on Monday they could get the cattle.
Q. Did you tell them before that?
A. Yes, sir. On two occasions.
Q. When?
A. One time was on Sunday, the 20th of May, Van Tucker called my house and I told him he could get the cattle but they would have to pay for the cattle, and they would have to let them stay in the sale barn two days, and if they didn't want the cattle, and I didn't get the money, I'd carry the cattle back home. There was no confusion with the cattle. One thing, the bank demanded the money be paid for the cattle because they had a deed of trust on my cattle and on my property and I had a chance of losing everything I had if the cattle left without being paid for.

*1032 It is to be noted that the quoted testimony makes no mention of delivery at "Tylertown", which the contract (as modified) provided. Lewis's defense (that he offered delivery as required by the contract) was affirmative in nature requiring proof with clarity. The quoted passage does not state with clarity that Lewis offered to make delivery to Tylertown as required by the contract.[1] None of this testimony can be taken to constitute a refusal of Ross to perform according to the contract. If anything, both Mr. Lewis's and Mrs. Lewis's testimony shows that they were not in an attitude of delivering the animals where contracted (at Tylertown) until Ross tendered the money. This is not according to the contractual terms. On May 29, Lewis took some of the animals to the Cow Palace sales barn in Fernwood and placed them in line for sale. When Ross's employees learned that the animals were at the Cow Palace, telephone calls were made to Cow Palace's president, defendant Delony, advising Delony that Ross had the cattle under contract. As to whether Delony actually saw the contract that day, his testimony is uncertain. Ross then employed counsel who filed a replevin suit seeking to stop the sale and gain possession of the animals for Ross, resulting in service of process upon Lewis, at which time Reeves admittedly looked at the papers the lawyer brought and was told it was a contract. Nevertheless, the cattle were sold for an amount in excess of that provided in the contract except that 113 were not sold or ever accounted for. Other facts will be stated where appropriate in this opinion.

First argument made is that the verdict was against the overwhelming weight of the evidence. In addition to the facts stated above, other significant facts are the following: Tylertown Bank had a lien against the cattle in the amount of $10,000 and the existence of it was unknown to Ross. After signing the contract, Lewis heard "rumors" that Ross was not in good financial shape. Arthur Van Tucker, a buyer for Ross, according to Lewis's testimony, called him early in the year demanding delivery, but he refused because the contract stated the delivery date to be between May 15 and May 30. Tucker denied this, and further testified that he talked to Lewis twice, once when Lewis called him to change the delivery point and another time around May 14 to see when he could take delivery. Lewis testified that during the conversation Tucker said Ross could not pay for the cattle upon delivery and that they were taking the cattle out of state for resale. This was denied by Tucker who contends he didn't even know where the cows were going.

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Bluebook (online)
415 So. 2d 1029, 34 U.C.C. Rep. Serv. (West) 913, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ross-cattle-co-v-lewis-miss-1982.