{"id":896480,"date":"2019-09-24T11:54:46","date_gmt":"2019-09-24T17:54:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.myconstructionexpert.com\/blog\/?p=896480"},"modified":"2019-09-24T11:54:50","modified_gmt":"2019-09-24T17:54:50","slug":"english-vs-rkk-saga-continues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myconstructionexpert.com\/blog\/english-vs-rkk-saga-continues\/","title":{"rendered":"English v. RKK. . . The Saga Continues"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Christopher G. Hill | Construction Law Musings<\/a> | September 18, 2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Remember back in 2018 when I thought\u00a0I\u2019d told you the end of the English Construction story<\/a>\u00a0regarding its various consultants, etc.?\u00a0 I was wrong.\u00a0 The matter went up on\u00a0appeal to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals\u00a0where the Appeals Court considered the summary judgment granted to the defendant Rummel, Klepper & Kahl (\u201cRKK\u201d) based upon what came down to a contributory negligence reading of the indemnity clause that was allowed to survive in the\u00a0first district court opinion\u00a0relating to these ambiguous contracts finding that English was negligent so couldn\u2019t recover.\u00a0 The 4th Circuit also considered the finding that defendant CDM Smith did not breach its contract as a matter of law and that English\u2019s negligence was the cause of the damages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Court of Appeals reversed both of the holdings by the Western District of Virginia court, essentially stating that there was enough of a factual dispute to render any summary judgment to be premature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As to English\u2019s arguments regarding the indemnity scheme in the contracts, the court found that the interpretation was at least ambiguous enough that summary judgment was inappropriate, stating:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While we are not prepared to settle conclusively these interpretation disputes at the summary judgment stage, English\u2019s proffered interpretation is, at the very least. reasonable. Indeed, of the two interpretations, English\u2019s seems to be more closely aligned with the actual language in the contract. The district court thus erred in rejecting English\u2019s interpretation and adopting RK&K\u2019s interpretation as a matter of law<\/em>.<\/p>

[A]t bottom, while the district court was authorized to construe unambiguous language as a matter of law, it could not resolve genuine disputes regarding the meaning of ambiguous contractual language against the nonmoving party on summary judgment. We therefore vacate the court\u2019s grant of summary judgment to RK&K and remand for further proceedings.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

In short, while I don\u2019t like ambiguity in the least when contracts are concerned, the ambiguity at least got English past summary judgment on this claim.  Furthermore, I think that English\u2019s \u201ccomparative negligence\u201d analysis is more proper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As to the CDM Smith ruling by the District Court, the 4th Circuit found that there was enough there as far as the level of violation and what breaches of contract may or may not have occurred that summary judgment was inappropriate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What does this mean, aside from having an\u00a0experienced construction attorney\u00a0such as those in this case is a great help?\u00a0 First of all, some clarity in the various documents would have gone a great way toward lowering the expense of this litigation.\u00a0 The ambiguity gave us lawyers something to argue about and because of that it has been close to three years and the case is just now moving forward on the facts.\u00a0 Second of all, indemnity clauses will be looked at carefully.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As always, I recommend that you read the case for yourself and draw your own conclusions.  Once you\u2019ve done that, please comment here. I always welcome input from readers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Christopher G. Hill | Construction Law Musings | September 18, 2019 Remember back in 2018 when I thought\u00a0I\u2019d told you the end of the English Construction story\u00a0regarding its various consultants, etc.?\u00a0 I was wrong.\u00a0 The matter went up on\u00a0appeal to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals\u00a0where the Appeals Court considered the summary judgment granted to… Continue reading English v. RKK. . . The Saga Continues<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9],"tags":[9895,9288,8901],"class_list":["post-896480","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-construction-contracts","tag-advise-consult","tag-indemnity-clause","tag-summary-judgment","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\nEnglish v. RKK. . . 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