Drummond Coal Sales, Inc. v. Norfolk Southern Railway Co., No. 20-1871 (4th Cir. 2021)
Annotate this Case
After a jury returned a special verdict finding Norfolk Southern materially breached its contract with Drummond, the district court entered a declaratory judgment for Drummond and awarded limited equitable relief.
The Fourth Circuit concluded that the district court properly denied Norfolk Southern's Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50(b) Motion and did not abuse its discretion in denying Drummond's Rule 59(e) Motion seeking complete rescission. In this case, the court saw no evidence from which a jury could reasonably conclude that Norfolk Southern expressly breached Article 13 of the Agreement. Furthermore, there was sufficient evidence for a reasonable jury to find that Norfolk Southern breached the implied duty of good faith and fair dealing. The court noted that whether or not there was evidence of damages is beside the point. In this case, the jury was only asked whether Norfolk Southern materially breached its agreement with Drummond and, if so, when. Given the court's standard of review, the discretion afforded to courts under Virginia law in making decisions about equitable relief, and the district court's expansive reasoning assessing equities unique to this case, the court declined to find that the district court abused its discretion in denying Drummond complete rescission.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.