Well That Sucked

Had a trial today live in Wayne County Circuit Court.  first live appearance down their since Covid started.  Had to wear a mask going into the building and it was rather hot and unpleasant.

Getting there was more than half the fun.

Due to Joe Biden being in town to visit the auto show, the highway exit I normally use to exit the highway and get to the courthouse was closed off.  No notice until I was right at the exit and saw it blocked with police cars.

So I had to navigate a rather roundabout way to the parking structure near the courthouse in rather heavy traffic that also had a really high percentage of police and DHS vehicles of all types around.  Upside, crime in downtown Detroit probably dropped significantly.

So I get there and we start.

Right off, I lose a motion I had filed to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, as I point out even if we total all their alleged damages and apply the law, it still doesn't reach the Circuit Court's $25,000.01 floor. 

Plaintiff cunningly argues we can ignore the law and facts that would fix their damages below the limit. and in a bizarro world ignoring the facts of the case, that they even admit to, they could be able to get over the limit if those facts are ignored.

The Court agrees and on to trial we go. It would be one of those trials.

In short, I knew going in that cannot win this trial in the normal sense of the word. 

There's not too many trials where I on the defense side get to say that we admit and stipulate to my clients breaching the contract (that is an uncontested fact), but the clients don't owe all the damages the Plaintiffs claim we do, but do owe some damages.  Plaintiffs refused to settle the case at all.

Clients were residential renters and had economic hardship due to Covid and lost their income.  They were evicted and now Landlord who is a complete dick, is suing for the entire Lease amount. They failed to re-rent the property and instead decided to list it for sale at a high amount and sold it after months of doing not much to sell it.

I argue they failed to mitigate and for at least four of the six months they seek additional damages, as they didn't even list the property at the time. I have the MLS listings(form them in discovery no less) to prove they didn't.

At trial, for the first time ever, they claim they put it up for sale as a FSBO without an agent and placed a sign out front during those 4 months.

I note they never produced any evidence of this in response to my discovery requests pre-trial, and  have no evidence they actually did it, and not even a picture of the sign to introduce as evidence.

The judge rules their claim that they did the FSBO, with no evidence but their testimony that they did it and nothing more, as credible to her, so we get slapped with those months as well.  Not happy about that ruling.

But the judge now wants me to do a brief on whether their choice not to try and rent it for those months at all affects their damages and if it could be considered a failure to mitigate.

Ugh. 

Well, at the very least, I saved my clients $1,000.00 when I get Plaintiff's claim of damages to the premises (there were none, it was a complete BS with a suspicious invoice for work allegedly done 3 months after they left) dismissed due to their not following Michigan law.

Oh yes, even if the damages are fully applied now they are still well under the jurisdictional limit.  Sheesh.