Wick Shopping Plaza Associates, LLC v. Nandana LLC ( 2024 )

NOT FOR PUBLICATION WITHOUT THE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-3904-21
WICK SHOPPING PLAZA
ASSOCIATES, LLC,
Plaintiff-Respondent,
v.
NANDANA LLC, SHIVAJI
LIMITED LIABILITY
COMPANY, HARIVENKATESH
RADHAKRISHNAN,
SARAVANAN THANGARAJU,
and PRADEEP KUMAR
VASIREDDI,
Defendants,
and
SURESH MUTHUPANDI,
Defendant-Appellant.
_____________________________
Submitted January 9, 2024 – Decided February 29, 2024
Before Judges Gooden Brown and Puglisi.
On appeal from the Superior Court of New Jersey, Law
Division, Middlesex County, Docket No. L-0245-21.
Suresh Muthupandi, appellant pro se.
Jamison & Jamison, attorneys for respondent (Paul
Thomas Jamison, on the brief).
PER CURIAM
Defendant Suresh Muthupandi (defendant) appeals from the trial court's
July 8, 2022 judgment and order awarding legal fees and costs to plaintiff Wick
Shopping Plaza Associates, LLC totaling $52,658.89. We affirm in part and
reverse and remand in part for entry of an amended judgment.
I.
Because we write primarily for the parties, who are familiar with the
record, we limit our recitation to those facts necessary to decide the issues on
appeal. In January 2015, Nandana, LLC (Nandana) executed a lease to rent
plaintiff's commercial property in Edison. Defendant signed a personal guaranty
of all the obligations under the lease. In March 2015, Nandana assigned the
lease to Shivaji Limited Liability Company (Shivaji), and defendant reaffirmed
his obligations under the lease.
In 2020, defendant and Shivaji failed to pay rent and other obligations due
under the lease. In June 2020, plaintiff served defendant notice of arrears
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totaling $15,211.98. Pursuant to the lease terms, defendant had three days to
pay the arrears to cure the breach, but he failed to do so. The following month,
plaintiff served defendant notice that he was considered a holdover tenant on a
month-to-month basis because the lease had expired in April. On two weeks'
notice to plaintiff, defendant vacated the premises on December 15, 2020.
Plaintiff filed a complaint alleging breach of contract and seeking to
enforce plaintiff's personal guaranty. On June 8 and 9, 2023, the court
conducted a trial without a jury. Among other witnesses, plaintiff's bookkeeper
testified to the various amounts plaintiff claimed were due, relying in part on a
detailed spreadsheet entered into the record. Although defendant did not contest
liability, he disputed the amount owed.
On June 9, 2022, the court found in favor of plaintiff, memorializing its
reasons in an oral decision on the record:
What this [c]ourt is grappling with is what is that
amount to be paid? We have the plaintiff's counsel who
summarized that his belief, based on accounting and all
of his witnesses['] testimony, is that $60,437.78 is due
without any credits for pre-payments and payments, for
instance, with security deposit of the rent and of
utilities as an example.
The defendant does not argue that rent and
common area maintenance charges are to be paid but
does argue the following. Well, the [c]ourt finds the
following. The [c]ourt finds that judgment shall be in
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favor of the plaintiff. However, that amount, this is
under the [seven]-day rule.[1] I'm going to ask counsel
for plaintiff to come up with an accounting in the form
of an order.
Show it to defense counsel as well. You're going
to come up with a dollar certain. Because the [c]ourt is
not equipped to go through P-12 and take out the
following charges. The judgment amount shall, of
course, reflect the proper credits for security deposits
and other credits. But the [c]ourt will specifically
disallow any accrued interest on amounts paid or due
for either sewer or water during the period of 2020.
The [c]ourt shall not permit any late charges or
interest accrued for that sewer or water payment. . . .
. . . The [c]ourt instructs the plaintiff's counsel to
attach to this under the [seven]-day rule a detailed
interest breakdown of all amounts that are due and all
interest that will be charged thereupon.
The [c]ourt also finds that the defendant vacated
the premises as of November [30], 2020. And so no
interest, no rent, no common area maintenance or any
other charges, including any accrued interest thereon
will be permitted after November 30[], 2020.
The judge urged counsel to consult with each other to arrive at a dollar
amount "agreed upon by all of the parties," because he was "loath[] to try to
come up [with] a dollar amount, considering that much of this . . . [was] mired
in accruing and continued accruing interest costs . . . on charges that [were] not
1
Rule 1:5-1.
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. . . permitted." The court also denied without prejudice plaintiff's motion for
attorney's fees, subject to its filing a conforming motion and supporting
documentation pursuant to Rule 4:42-9(b).
Plaintiff re-filed a motion for attorney's fees along with its proposed order
of judgment. Plaintiff also filed a certification of counsel that explained its
revised accounting which reversed certain charges, fees and interest. Appended
to the certification were two spreadsheets: an amended version of the
accounting the bookkeeper referred to at trial, showing the reversal of amounts
disallowed by the court; and a detail of the amounts due and payments made for
sewer, water, rent, taxes, insurance, late fees and interest. The total amount
sought was $34,934.09, which included outstanding sewer charges totaling
$5,417.86 and interest totaling $8,162.60.
Defendant submitted a letter asserting the correct amount of the sewer bill
was $3,350.92, objecting to the attorney's fees billed for updating and creating
the spreadsheets, and generally disputing plaintiff's accounting.
On July 8, 2022, the court entered judgment in favor of plaintiff for
$52,658.89, comprised of the $34,934.09 judgment plus $17,724.80 in attorney's
fees and costs. The court's order states:
Plaintiff is permitted to recover reasonable attorney's
fees pursuant to R. 4:88-4 and R. 4:42-9(b). However,
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it is not reasonable to compensate [p]laintiff's attorney
for travel time and time spent creating a spreadsheet for
this [c]ourt to distill [p]laintiff's "Aging Detail"
document. Fees have been accordingly reduced.
This appeal follows.
Although defendant's brief points are not a model of clarity, we glean he
seeks to raise three issues: he was ordered to pay an incorrect amount for sewer
charges; he should not have to pay attorney's fees related to correcting plaintiff's
books; and the eighteen percent interest should have been calculated on the
outstanding balance of the security deposit, not on the outstanding balance owed
after defendant moved out of the premises. Plaintiff's brief on appeal contends
the sewer charges were correct and the attorney's fee award was within the
court's discretion, but does not squarely address the issue of interest.
II.
A court's findings "are considered binding on appeal when supported by
adequate, substantial and credible evidence." Rova Farms Resort, Inc. v. Invs.
Ins. Co., 65 N.J. 474, 484 (1974). On appeal from a bench trial, this court
"give[s] deference to the trial court that heard the witnesses, sifted the competing
evidence, and made reasoned conclusions." Griepenburg v. Twp. of Ocean, 220
N.J. 239, 254 (2015).
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This court should not "disturb the factual findings and legal conclusions
of the trial judge unless we are convinced that they are so manifestly
unsupported by or inconsistent with the competent, relevant, and reasonably
credible evidence as to offend the interests of justice." Rova Farms, 65 N.J. at
484 (quoting Fagliarone v. Twp. of N. Bergen, 78 N.J. Super. 154, 155 (1963)).
"[A] reviewing court will disturb a trial court's award of counsel fees 'only
on the rarest of occasion, and then only because of a clear abuse of discretion. '"
Litton Indus., Inc. v. IMO Indus., Inc., 200 N.J. 372, 386 (2009) (quoting
Packard-Bamberger & Co., Inc. v. Collier, 167 N.J. 427, 444 (2001) (internal
quotation marks omitted)).
Guided by these standards, we address defendant's contentions in turn.
With regard to the sewer charges, defendant's claim the court awarded the
incorrect amount is belied by the documentation in the record. The bookkeeper's
testimony, which was supported by the spreadsheet and copies of the estimated
and actual sewer bills, established defendant owed $1,066.94 2 for 2018 (billed
2
Defendant's figures do not include any amount owed for 2018, but the record
reflects a bill of $2,066.94 with a payment of $1,000, leaving $1,066.94
outstanding. Although the accounting incorrectly reflected $2,066.94 as the
amount due, apparently the correct figure was used in calculating the total
amount due, as noted above.
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in 2019); $2,028.62 for 2019 (billed in 2020); and $1,322.303 in 2020 (billed in
2021), for a total of $5,417.86. We are unpersuaded by defendant's argument
he owed a lesser sum. The court's order for this amount is supported by the
evidence in the record, and we see no reason to disturb it.
As to the attorney's fees, plaintiff's motion was supported by an itemized
certificate of legal services and costs. Contrary to defendant's contention, the
trial court disallowed travel time and time billed for creating a spreadsheet. The
amount sought by plaintiff, $22,575 for 64.5 hours billed, was reduced by $5,670
for 16.2 hours billed for travel time and work on the spreadsheets, resulting in a
fee award of $16,905. We discern no abuse of discretion in the court's order for
attorney's fees.
We reach a different conclusion with regard to the amount ordered in
interest. Because defendant vacated the premises on November 30, 2020, the
court ordered "no interest, no rent, no common area maintenance or any other
charges, including any accrued interest thereon" would be awarded after that
3
Because the township billed an estimated sewer bill, which it then adjusted
with the actual usage, the amount due for 2020 usage was reflected in the
accounting as the estimated bill of $2,066.94 minus the actual bill of $1,3 22.30
for a credit of $744.64. We note the May 19, 2022 invoice prepared by plaintiff
incorrectly reflected the actual bill is $1,332.30 but nevertheless correctly
calculated the credit as $744.64.
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date. Counsel's certification explaining the proposed judgment did not address
this reduction, and the spreadsheets reflected charges of $478.19 in January
2021 for interest accrued in December 2020, $5,639.30 for interest accrued in
2021, and $2,458.42 for interest accrued from January 1 through June 17, 2022.
However, it appears that the 2022 interest was entered in the incorrect column
on the summary spreadsheet and therefore was not included in the total amount
of interest calculated as due.
Because the court disallowed any interest accruing after November 30,
2020, its subsequent order including $6,117.49 in interest charged after that date
was not supported by the record. Accordingly, we reverse that portion of the
court's order and remand for entry of an amended order reducing the judgment
amount from $34,934.09 to $28,816.60.
Affirmed in part, reversed and remanded in part. We do not retain
jurisdiction.
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