Suffield Development Associates Ltd. Partnership v. National Loan Investors, L.P.

763 A.2d 1049, 60 Conn. App. 842, 2000 Conn. App. LEXIS 572
CourtConnecticut Appellate Court
DecidedNovember 28, 2000
DocketAC 20007
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 763 A.2d 1049 (Suffield Development Associates Ltd. Partnership v. National Loan Investors, L.P.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Connecticut Appellate Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Suffield Development Associates Ltd. Partnership v. National Loan Investors, L.P., 763 A.2d 1049, 60 Conn. App. 842, 2000 Conn. App. LEXIS 572 (Colo. Ct. App. 2000).

Opinion

[844]*844 Opinion

PETERS, J.

The dispositive issue in this civil appeal is the construction of a payment term in a stipulated judgment. The payment term limited monetary liability in this case to the proceeds of a judgment yet to be rendered in a pending case that would determine the liability of a third party to the putative payor. Specifically, the question is whether the right to recover such proceeds includes proceeds that resulted from a settlement of the third party action during the pendency of a retrial subsequent to appellate reversal of the original judgment against the third party. We agree with the trial court’s resolution of this issue.

The plaintiff, Suffield Development Associates Limited Partnership, brought a declaratory judgment action to clarify its obligation to pay the defendant, National Loan Investors Limited Partnership, $200,000 from the settlement of its claims against Society for Savings (bank).1 The defendant asserted its right to payment. After a trial, the court rendered judgment against the plaintiff, from which the plaintiff appeals. The defendant has filed a cross appeal challenging the court’s calculation of the amount of its recovery.

The court’s memorandum of decision and the record reveal the following undisputed facts. On December 17, 1996, the plaintiff and the defendant entered into a stipulated judgment2 to settle a foreclosure action.3 At [845]*845that time, the plaintiff had succeeded at trial in a lender liability action against the bank, but the bank had filed an appeal that had not yet been resolved. Subsequently, on appeal, our Supreme Court reversed the judgment and remanded the case for a new trial on one issue. Suffield Development Associates Ltd. Partnership v. Society for Savings, 243 Conn. 832, 846, 708 A.2d 1361 (1998).

Before the commencement of the new trial, the plaintiff and the bank entered into a settlement of the lender-liability case. Shortly thereafter, the defendant brought the present action asserting a claim of entitlement to a portion of the proceeds from the settlement in the lender liability action pursuant to the terms of the stipulated judgment entered into by the plaintiff and the defendant in the foreclosure action.

The plaintiff objected to the defendant’s claim on the ground that the deficiency judgment in favor of the defendant could be satisfied only from the proceeds of a “certain Lender Liability Judgment” in a “certain civil action.” According to the plaintiff, the decision of our Supreme Court reversing that “certain Lender Liability Judgment” had the effect of extinguishing that judgment in its entirety so that there no longer was any basis for any monetary recovery from the plaintiff.

The trial court in this case concluded, as the defendant had argued, that the proceeds from the settlement [846]*846of the lender liability action pending retrial after reversal constituted proceeds from the “certain Lender Liability Judgment” described in the stipulated judgment. Accordingly, it rendered judgment ordering the plaintiff to pay $200,000 to the defendant. The plaintiff has appealed on the merits, and the defendant has cross appealed with respect to the amount of the judgment.

I

PLAINTIFF’S APPEAL

On appeal, the plaintiffs principal argument is that the court misconstrued the phrase “a certain Lender Liability Judgment” in the stipulated judgment. Because the plaintiffs appeal turns on the construction of documentary evidence of the terms of a stipulated judgment, which is a contract, our review of the court’s judgment is plenary and its language is accorded its common meaning and usage. HLO Land Ownership Associates Ltd. Partnership v. Hartford, 248 Conn. 350, 356-57, 727 A.2d 1260 (1999).

The plaintiff makes two arguments to persuade us to overturn the court’s construction of the phrase “certain Lender Liability Judgment” in the foreclosure action. The first is that the lender liability action was terminated not by judgment but by settlement and, therefore, the prerequisite judgment was not established. The second is that the lender liability action was terminated by our Supreme Court’s reversal and that subsequent events fall outside of the “certain Lender Liability Judgment.” We find no merit in either of these contentions.

The plaintiffs first argument cannot survive in light of its own concession, in its brief and at oral argument, that had the lender liability action been settled before the reversal of the judgment, the defendant would have been entitled to proceeds pursuant to the stipulated [847]*847judgment. We are not persuaded that a post-reversal settlement stands on a different footing.

In its principal argument, the plaintiff claims, in essence, that we should break the lender liability action into two parts, the judgment before disposition of the appeal to the Supreme Court, and the remand for retrial ordered by that court. It essentially argues that, upon reversal by our Supreme Court, the “certain Lender Liability Judgment” contemplated in the stipulated judgment was extinguished for two reasons.

First, the plaintiff argues that our Supreme Court’s reversal of the judgment in the lender liability action extinguished the judgment contemplated by the parties to the foreclosure action because the retrial of the lender liability action, had it taken place, would have addressed a legal issue that previously had not been part of that action. At oral argument, the plaintiffs counsel conceded that the fact that the case was remanded on a previously undecided claim of promissory estoppel was not “where the action” was and, had our Supreme Court reversed the judgment on the basis of an evidentiary issue, he would still advance the same argument. Therefore, it did not matter that the lender liability settlement involved a cause of action based on promissory estoppel.

Second, the plaintiff argues, essentially, that our Supreme Court’s reversal of the trial court’s judgment in the lender liability action was a final judgment. Therefore, it maintains that the “certain Lender Liability Judgment” contemplated by the parties was extinguished, leaving the defendant with virtually nothing on which to premise its monetary claim.

Our Supreme Court has held that, if an appeal is pending and “there is reversible error, the final judgment is that of the appellate court.” Preisner v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 203 Conn. 407, 415, 525 A.2d [848]*84883 (1987); see Varley v. Varley, 181 Conn. 58, 61 n.4, 434 A.2d 312 (1980); see also Saunders v. Saunders, 140 Conn. 140, 146, 98 A.2d 815 (1953). Preisner and the cases cited therein did not, however, involve circumstances in which the judgments of the trial court were reversed and the cases were remanded for new trials. In such a situation, because the parties’ rights still maybe affected by further proceedings, the judgment is not final. State v.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
763 A.2d 1049, 60 Conn. App. 842, 2000 Conn. App. LEXIS 572, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/suffield-development-associates-ltd-partnership-v-national-loan-connappct-2000.