Howard B. Fine, Appellee, v. Neale Construction Co., Inc., A Corporation, Appellant

Kansas Supreme Court1960-05-14No. No. 41,234

186 Kan. 537352 P.2d 404

Summary · law.co

Holding. The trial court's judgment for the plaintiff was affirmed. The appellate court found that substantial competent evidence supported the trial court's finding that the plaintiff did not agree to cancel any portion of his salary, wages, or expenses owed by the defendant.

Howard B. Fine brought suit against Neale Construction Co., Inc. to recover unpaid salary and expense reimbursement. The company denied owing the money and claimed that Fine, who served as an officer and director, had agreed with other company officers to waive all salary and expense claims until the company's financial condition improved. The trial court found that no such agreement existed and awarded Fine $8,111.27.

On appeal, Neale Construction challenged the trial court's findings, arguing that contradictory evidence in the record demonstrated no substantial support for the court's conclusion that Fine had not agreed to cancel his compensation. The appellate court applied the established standard that when findings of fact are supported by evidence, the existence of contradictory evidence that might have led to different conclusions is irrelevant on appeal. The court examined the record and determined that substantial competent evidence supported the trial court's findings, and that the defendant failed to meet its burden of persuading the fact-finder.

Summary generated by law.co from the public-domain opinion. The opinion text itself is public domain.

Key issues

Whether an agreement existed between the plaintiff and defendant company officers to cancel the plaintiff's salary and expense claims
Whether the trial court's findings of fact were supported by substantial competent evidence
Standard of review when contradictory evidence exists at trial

Procedural posture

The defendant Neale Construction Co., Inc. appealed from a judgment rendered in favor of the plaintiff following a consolidation and joint trial of two related salary and expense recovery actions.

Authorities cited

No cited authorities resolved to law.co cases yet.

Opinion · public domain

majority opinion

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Price, J.:

The plaintiff, Howard B. Fine, brought two actions— one against the Telephone & Power Supply Co., and the other against the Neale Construction Co., Inc., to recover certain salary and expense money. The actions were consolidated and tried together in the trial court, and in each case judgment was rendered for plaintiff. Each of the defendants appealed, and in the first-mentioned case the judgment was affirmed in Fine v. Telephone & Power Supply Co., 185 Kan. 383, 345 P. 2d 616.

This appeal is by the defendant, Neale Construction Co., Inc.

It is unnecessary to set forth the pleadings of the parties except to say that plaintiff alleged defendant company was indebted to him for salary and certain expenses. This indebtedness was denied by defendant, and it is claimed that plaintiff, who was an officer and director of defendant, agreed with other officers to cancel and relinquish all salaries and claims after a certain date and until improvement was shown in the financial condition of defendant.

Except for the differences in identity of parties defendant, dates and amounts involved, the record in this case parallels closely that in the telephone company case, above, and for that reason will not be detailed.

At the conclusion of the trial the court made findings of fact covering the matters in issue, and specifically found that at no time did plaintiff agree to cancel any part of his salary, wages or expense money owing by defendant. The conclusion of law was that plaintiff was entitled to judgment in the amount of $8,111.27.

Defendant’s post-trial motions being overruled, it has appealed, and alleges ten assignments of error, most of which are in a sense collateral to the real basic question involved — namely, whether there was an agreement among the parties to cancel salaries.

In its brief defendant calls our attention to certain testimony and evidence in the record which tends to contradict the findings of the trial court, and, while conceding the firmly-established rule hereafter mentioned, contends the record is devoid of any substantial evidence to support the trial court’s findings.

No useful purpose would be served by detailing the evidence which would support findings contrary to those made, for in all cases where findings are supported by the evidence it is of no consequence on appeal that there may have been much contradictory evidence introduced which, if believed by the trial court, would have compelled entirely different findings of fact and an entirely different judgment. For a thorough discussion of this rule reference is made to Bruington v. Wagoner, 100 Kan. 439, 164 Pac. 1057, and see also In re Estate of Guest, 182 Kan. 760, 766, 324 P. 2d 184.

Much of that which was said and held in the telephone company case, above, applies with equal force to the matter before us. We have examined this record and, although the evidence was contradictory in many respects, nevertheless, it may not be said there was no substantial competent evidence to support the findings made. Defendant simply did not sustain the burden of convincing the trier of the facts of its contentions and theory of the case. Other matters argued in the briefs have been examined and considered but, in view of our conclusion, require no discussion. We find no error in the record and the judgment is therefore affirmed.