Johnson v Commercial Constr. Tech., Inc.

[*1] Johnson v Commercial Constr. Tech., Inc. 2012 NY Slip Op 50422(U) Decided on March 6, 2012 Appellate Term, Second Department Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431. This opinion is uncorrected and will not be published in the printed Official Reports.

Decided on March 6, 2012
SUPREME COURT, APPELLATE TERM, SECOND DEPARTMENT, 9th and 10th JUDICIAL DISTRICTS
PRESENT: : NICOLAI, P.J., LaCAVA and IANNACCI, JJ
2010-3233 S C.

Jill Johnson, Appellant,

against

Commercial Construction Technologies, Inc., Respondent.

Appeal, on the ground of inadequacy, from a judgment of the District Court of Suffolk County, Third District (C. Stephen Hackeling, J.), entered August 23, 2010. The judgment, after a nonjury trial, awarded plaintiff the principal sum of $78.

ORDERED that the judgment is modified by providing that the award in favor of plaintiff is increased by $705 to the principal sum of $783; as so modified, the judgment is affirmed, without costs.

Plaintiff commenced this small claims action to recover $5,000 from defendant for failure to complete work under a $30,000 home improvement contract, for overcharging her and for property damage. Defendant interposed a counterclaim to recover, among other things, the sum of $705 as the balance due on the contract. After a nonjury trial, the District Court found that plaintiff was due a total of $783, which sum was offset by $705, the amount plaintiff owed on the contract. Consequently, a judgment was entered in favor of plaintiff in the principal sum of $78.

The decision of a fact-finding court should not be disturbed upon appeal unless it is obvious that the court's conclusions could not be reached under any fair interpretation of the evidence (see Claridge Gardens v Menotti, 160 AD2d 544 [1990]). This standard applies with [*2]greater force to judgments rendered in the Small Claims Part of the court (see Williams v Roper, 269 AD2d at 126).

Upon a review of the record, we conclude that the judgment did not provide the parties with substantial justice according to the rules and principles of substantive law (UDCA 1804, 1807; see Ross v Friedman, 269 AD2d 584 [2000]; Williams v Roper, 269 AD2d 125, 126 [2000]). While most of plaintiff's contentions on appeal lack merit, we find that the District Court erred in determining that plaintiff still owed defendant a balance of $705 on the contract. Plaintiff had submitted into evidence a signed final invoice by defendant's owner, in which he agreed to accept the sum of $3,645 as the final balance due on the contract, rather than the final balance initially specified of $4,350. Accordingly, the principal amount of the judgment awarded to plaintiff should be increased by $705 to the principal sum of $783.

Nicolai, P.J., LaCava and Iannacci, JJ., concur.
Decision Date: March 06, 2012