DONG HO LEE v. EUN KYUNG PARK

NOT FOR PUBLICATION WITHOUT THE

APPROVAL OF THE APPELLATE DIVISION

This opinion shall not "constitute precedent or be binding upon any court." Although it is posted on the internet, this opinion is binding only on the parties in the case and its use in other cases is limited. R.1:36-3.

SUPERIOR COURT OF NEW JERSEY

APPELLATE DIVISION

DOCKET NO. A-0

DONG HO LEE,

Plaintiff-Respondent,

v.

EUN KYUNG PARK, BYUNG CHUN

SONG and MOO GUNG WHA

RESTAURANT, LLC,

Defendants/Third-Party

Plaintiffs-Appellants,

v.

YOUNG HA LEE,

Third-Party Defendant.

________________________________________________________________

December 6, 2016

Submitted November 15, 2016 Decided

Before Judges Rothstadt and Sumners.

On appeal from Superior Court of New Jersey, Law Division, Bergen County, Docket No. L-11034-09.

Kimm Law Firm, attorneys for appellants (Michael S. Kimm and Adam Garcia, on the brief).

Respondent Dong Ho Lee has not filed a brief.

PER CURIAM

In this appeal, we are asked to address for a second time the parties' contract dispute over defendants Eun Kyung Park's and Byung Chun Song's attempt to purchase a restaurant and liquor license from plaintiff Dong Ho Lee. After considering defendants' earlier appeal from a jury's award of $247,987.32 to plaintiff, we vacated the judgment entered in plaintiff's favor after we determined the parties' contract was unlawful and the jury's damage award was unsupported by the evidence. See Lee v. Park, No. A-2273-12 (App. Div. May 27, 2015) (slip op. at 16, 36). We also remanded the matter and directed the trial court to order the return of $60,000 to plaintiff that the trial court released to plaintiff upon the entry of judgment from funds deposited into court as part of an earlier attempt to settle the matter. Id. at 39-40. On remand, the trial court ordered the return of those funds to defendants, rejecting defendants' arguments they were entitled to more than the amount we ordered.

On appeal from the trial court's order, defendants make the same argument, claiming they are entitled to an order requiring plaintiff "to disgorge the full benefit of ill-gotten gains from illegal agreements [so that defendants] should be made whole." According to defendants, they are entitled to a judgment against plaintiff in the "amount of $259,000 plus statutory interest, representing all monies paid by defendants to plaintiff."

We have considered defendants' contentions in light of our review of the record and the applicable legal principles and conclude that their arguments are without sufficient merit to warrant discussion in a written opinion. R. 2:11-3(e)(1)(E). Suffice it to say the trial court followed our directive in only awarding the $60,000 to defendants and we again reject defendants' claims for anything more for the same reasons stated in our earlier opinion.

Affirmed.