JUERGEN HERMANNS v. RICHARD COLLETTI et al.

 

NOT FOR PUBLICATION WITHOUT THE

APPROVAL OF THE APPELLATE DIVISION

SUPERIOR COURT OF NEW JERSEY

APPELLATE DIVISION

DOCKET NO. A-2961-03T52961-03T5

JUERGEN HERMANNS,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.

RICHARD COLLETTI and HUNTERDON

AUTO SALES,

Defendants-Respondents.

__________________________________

 

Argued October 31, 2005 - Decided

Before Judges Parrillo and Holston, Jr.

On appeal from the Superior Court of New Jersey,

Law Division, Special Civil Part, Hunterdon County, Docket No. DC-1088-03.

Robert J. Bernot argued the cause for pro se appellant, Hermanns.

Jeffrey M. Gonzalez argued the cause for respondent.

PER CURIAM

Plaintiff, Juergen Hermanns, appeals from a Special Civil Part judgment, entered after a bench trial, awarding him $1,828.78, which represented his expenses only, and dismissing his additional claim for unpaid wages totaling $11,720. We affirm.

The facts may be briefly stated. Defendant, Richard Colletti, was the principal of defendant, Hunterdon Auto Sales, a car dealership. Defendants were in the business of purchasing used cars at wholesale auction, reconditioning them and then reselling the cars at wholesale auction. Participation in these auctions is limited to car dealers who possess dealer plates. Plaintiff, who is not a car dealer, was unable to purchase vehicles at auction without the assistance of a credentialed dealer. Consequently, an arrangement was struck orally between plaintiff and defendants that defendants would purchase vehicles at auction on plaintiff's behalf. Plaintiff would then reimburse defendants, take title to the vehicles, use defendants' shop to recondition the vehicles, and sell the vehicles in his own name. In exchange, plaintiff would assist defendant by performing various tasks such as driving the defendants' vehicles to and from auctions.

According to plaintiff, some time prior to April 2001, this arrangement changed to one in which he was to receive monetary compensation directly. In fact, although he offered no supporting documentary proof, plaintiff claimed that defendants had actually paid him wages from January 2000 to December 2001, with the exception of a six-month period from April 2001, through October 2001, for which he is now seeking compensation. As proof of the hours he supposedly worked for defendants during this six-month period, plaintiff relied exclusively on handwritten "notes" that he unilaterally maintained. Defendants, on the other hand, denied that the original arrangement had ever been modified or that they agreed to pay plaintiff monetary compensation for his services.

At the conclusion of trial, the judge found credible evidence of plaintiff's reasonable expectation to be reimbursed for expenses incurred and, as a result, awarded him judgment in the amount of $1,828.78. In contrast, the judge found no reliable evidence of an agreement for hourly compensation and, therefore, dismissed plaintiff's wage claim. The judge explained:

What is not at all clear through the evidence presented by the plaintiff is what form of compensation plaintiff was supposed to receive from the defendant. The best that I can gather from the evidence is that the arrangement was that Mr. Hermanns would get a share of the proceeds of sale of cars that were purchased and reconditioned and sold in the way that I've described.

There is no real evidence before me, certainly no reliable evidence, that there was any kind of arrangement for hourly compensation for Mr. Hermanns' work. He doesn't have any records of what hours he worked and what compensation he received before April of 2001 or between October and December of 2001. So I don't have anything to rely on to: 1) establish that there was an arrangement for hourly pay; and 2) what that hourly pay would have been.

Instead, based on Mr. Colletti's testimony and the description of the business arrangement that he gave me it seems most likely that the agreement was that Mr. Hermanns would work on certain cars and when the cars were sold if they belonged to Mr. Hermanns, if they -- if title had been transferred to Mr. Hermanns, then Hunterdon Auto Sales would take $100 over the purchase price of the automobile and the remainder would be profit that would be turned over to Mr. Hermanns. But when the cars belonged to Hunterdon Auto Sales, I'm not sure if that was the arrangement. Instead the arrangement might have been some kind of splitting of profit on the cars between Mr. Hermanns and Mr. Colletti. Whether that splitting of profit was based on the number of hours that Mr. Hermanns had put in on a car that belonged to Hunterdon Auto Sales, I don't know because there are no records.

. . . The problem is that I don't know what . . . [plaintiff's handwritten notes] mean because in order for there to be a connection between P-1 in evidence, the records, the business records that Mr. Hermanns made and his claim, I need to be able to tell that his pay was somehow geared to the number of hours that he worked. But I don't know if that's true at all or not. It very well may that this was an independent business that Mr. Hermanns was as Mr. Colletti has testified and he was keeping records for himself. He was keeping records of how much he had spent on individual cars, how much time he had put into it and this was some way of gaging [sic] whether or not this business was profitable for him or not.

The records that he's given me without any matching records to show that pay he received for similar hours of work put into cars doesn't tell me that his compensation in the past before April 2001 or between and December of 2001, was based on the number of hours that he put in. So I don't have any precise terms of this oral agreement between the parties with respect to what amounts Mr. Hermanns should be getting paid.

. . . .

In addition to that, I do credit the testimony of Mr. Colletti and his witness, his brother-in-law, that there was an arrangement here where there was an exchange of favors, as they called it. Mr. Colletti allowed Mr. Hermanns to use the dealer plates so that he could pick up cars, recondition them and sell them. He allowed Mr. Hermanns to use his shop to do his work. And on the other hand, in exchange Mr. Hermanns did work on various cars which Hunterdon Auto Sales sold and presumably received some profit it. So, there was that kind of exchange or quid pro quo between the parties. I do credit that.

. . . .

Because the plaintiff has failed to show what specific compensation he was entitled to with respect to each of these cars that were sold, I can't give him a judgment for the $13,548.78 that he's seeking here. I conclude that the only items that Mr. Hermanns has proven sufficiently for me to rely on are his actual expenses in doing the various work that he said he did. I will not compensate him for the $20 per hour because I conclude that his work might very well have been the exchange that Mr. Colletti talked about if he was supposed to get some profit. I don't know what that is and he hasn't proven that as it is his burden to show me what that profit was.

On appeal, plaintiff argues:

I. Plaintiff/Appellant met his burden of proof to represent his claim for unpaid wages.

II. The Court conceded appellant's record/time sheets but was troubled by respondent's lack of any records.

If the Court accepted the submitted records on this issue of accrued money expenses, it is illogical not to accept the record with respect to time worked.

III. No one questioned veracity of time sheets or hourly rate applied.

We have considered each of these issues in light of the record, the applicable law, and the arguments of counsel and plaintiff pro se, and we are satisfied that none of them is of sufficient merit to warrant discussion in a written opinion. R. 2:11-3(e)(1)(A) & (E). Suffice it to say, our review of the record reveals substantial evidence to sustain the trial judge's factual and legal conclusions. Rova Farms Resort, Inc. v. Investors Ins. Co. of Am., 65 N.J. 474, 484 (1974). Accordingly, we affirm substantially for the reasons stated by the trial judge in his oral opinion of December 15, 2003. We add only the further observation that the same failure of proof that barred recovery under plaintiff's breach of contract claim would also have proven fatal to a claim based on quantum meruit or unjust enrichment, if properly pled.

 
Affirmed.

(continued)

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A-2961-03T5

November 16, 2005