Michael Chambers v. Jessica Cobb

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DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT OF APPEALS
No. 17-CV-678
MICHAEL CHAMBERS, APPELLANT, 10/4/2018
V.
JESSICA COBB, APPELLEE.
Appeal from the Superior Court
of the District of Columbia
(LTB-30715-15)
(Hon. Joan Zeldon, Trial Judge)
(Submitted June 4, 2018 Decided August 9, 2018)*
Michael Chambers, pro se.
Adrian P. Torres was on the brief for appellee.
Before FISHER, THOMPSON, and EASTERLY, Associate Judges.
THOMPSON, Associate Judge: Pro se appellant Michael Chambers appeals
from a May 22, 2017, judgment of the Superior Court Landlord and Tenant Branch
enforcing a court-approved settlement agreement between Chambers (and his wife)
and appellee Jessica Cobb. The court enforced the settlement agreement upon a
*
The decision in this case was originally issued as an unpublished
Memorandum Opinion and Judgment. It is now being published upon the court’s
grant of a motion to publish by the District of Columbia Office of the Tenant
Advocate.
2
finding that Cobb, the former tenant of a property owned by the Chamberses,
substantially complied with the agreement. Mr. Chambers’s primary contention on
appeal is that the court’s ruling effectively modified the terms of the settlement
agreement. We affirm.
I.
The settlement agreement, entered into by the parties on October 4, 2016,
and approved by the court, arose out of a complaint filed by the Chamberses in the
Landlord and Tenant Branch to recover possession of the Chamberses’ property at
2406 Perry Street, N.E. (“the property”), pursuant to the recovery for “personal use
and occupancy” clause of D.C. Code § 42-3505.01 (d). The parties agreed to entry
of a nonredeemable judgment of possession, which was to be stayed until
March 31, 2017, the agreed-upon date by which Ms. Cobb was to move out of the
property.1 The first sentence of ¶ 1 of the agreement obligated Ms. Cobb to
“vacate the [p]roperty, leave broom-clean, and return all keys to [the Chamberses]
1
Ms. Cobb asserts in her brief that she resided in the property for “almost
thirty years.”
3
no later than 5 pm” on that date. The next sentence of the agreement states that
“[t]ime is of the essence.” Under ¶ 3 of the agreement, Ms. Cobb was further
required to pay rent “in the amount of $800.00 per month” for October and
November of that year and was “responsible for the full and timely payment of all
utilities through the date she vacates.” The settlement agreement provided that
“[i]f and only if [Ms. Cobb] vacates as required in ¶ 1, and pays as required in ¶ 3,”
the Chamberses would “[r]emit to [her] funds in the amount of $4,000.00 by
March 31, 2017.”2
On April 18, 2017, Ms. Cobb moved to reopen the case to enforce the
settlement agreement. At a hearing on that motion on May 22, 2017, the motion
judge heard testimony from Mr. Chambers and from Monique Cobb, appellee
Cobb’s daughter, who had resided with her mother in the property (hereafter,
“Monique”). Monique told the court that when Mr. Chambers and his wife
“showed up” at the property on March 31 at “about 4:50 p.m.,” she told them that
she had asked Ms. Cobb’s counsel to send Mr. Chambers an email “to ask for an
extension of time.” Monique further testified that she told the Chamberses that the
Cobb family had moved household items out of the property “on multiple times”
2
In addition to this $4,000, the settlement agreement provided that
“[c]ontemporaneous with execution of this [a]greement,” the Chamberses were to
pay Ms. Cobb $6,000. That payment is not in issue in this appeal.
4
and had called for bulk trash pickup in connection with the move, but on March 31
had been slowed down in moving remaining household items because “it was
windy, it was raining, [and] it was storming.” Monique testified that she told the
Chamberses that the Cobb family “would be done [moving out] at 9:00 p.m.”
Monique further testified that she “waited after 9:00 p.m. about 20 minutes to see
if [the Chamberses] . . . would return.” Since they did not return, Monique left a
note dated March 31, 2017, 9:17 p.m., which Mr. Chambers read to the court, that
stated in pertinent part, “Please see inside envelope for keys. Regarding trash
outside, we will be back to collect this weekend.”
The court received documentary evidence that Ms. Cobb’s counsel sent an
email to Mr. Chambers on March 31 at 4:43 p.m. “asking for a slight extension
until 9:00 pm [that] []night to move everything,” explaining that Ms. Cobb was
“moving out the last bit of [her] belongings,” but that “the rain ha[d] unfortunately
slowed down that process.” Mr. Chambers responded at 5:07 p.m. stating that
appellee was “supposed to be out by 5:00 p.m.,” that she had therefore “violated
condition #1” of the settlement agreement, and that he would therefore “not be
paying [her] the remainder [$4,000] of the money.”
5
Mr. Chambers told the court that after receiving the email from Ms. Cobb’s
counsel at 4:43 p.m. on March 31 requesting an extension of time and responding
with an email denying the request, and after leaving the property at the conclusion
of his discussion with Monique, he “did not return [to the property] until [he] got
[a] notice from [Ms. Cobb’s counsel] . . . on April 3,” stating that “[t]he Cobbs
vacated the apartment on March 31st and left the keys to access the property in the
mailbox at that time.”
At the conclusion of the testimony, the motion judge ruled that Ms. Cobb
had “substantially complied with the [settlement] agreement,” that any breach was
“de minimis,” and that “whatever [Mr. Chambers was] supposed to do for [Ms.
Cobb] under th[e] agreement still is viable.”
This appeal followed. Mr. Chambers argues that by its ruling, the Superior
Court effectively modified the terms of the settlement agreement, a resolution that
Mr. Chambers asserts was “beyond [the] court’s authority” and improperly
required him to “do something [i.e., pay the $4,000] that was conditioned upon
[Ms. Cobb’s] fully complying with [the] provision” that required her to have
moved out of the property by 5:00 p.m. on March 31, 2017. Mr. Chambers
contends that the court’s ruling ignored the agreement’s “time is of the essence”
6
clause.3 Ms. Cobb relies on contract case law from this jurisdiction and others that
looks to whether a breach was material or de minimis and whether the non-
breaching party was harmed by the breach, and case law that declines to rigidly
apply time-is-of-the-essence clauses so as to avoid forfeitures, particularly in non-
commercial contexts.
II.
This court has stressed “the importance of enforcing valid consent
judgments,” observing that where a consent judgment has been entered embodying
3
Appellant also contends that the Superior Court judge “fail[ed] to state a
‘discernible reason’ to support her ruling,” and “erred in failing to issue written
findings of fact and conclusions of law to support her ruling” and “in allowing
testimony of [Monique] who was not a signatory to the settlement agreement.” To
the first point, the trial judge succinctly stated the basis for her ruling, i.e. that any
breach was de minimis and that Ms. Cobb substantially complied with the
settlement agreement. To the second point, ‘“[p]roceedings in the Landlord and
Tenant Branch are of a summary nature,”’ Davis v. Rental Assocs., Inc., 456 A.2d
820, 822 (D.C. 1983) (quoting Mahdi v. Poretsky Mgmt., Inc., 433 A.2d 1085,
1088 (D.C. 1981)), and there is no requirement (as there is in some divisions of the
Superior Court, see, e.g., Super. Ct. Dom. Rel. R. 52 (a)) that the Landlord and
Tenant Court issue written findings of fact or conclusions of law. And to the third
point, Monique was an eyewitness to what transpired on the designated move-out
day, and the court acted well within its discretion in allowing Monique to testify on
personal knowledge about the events and conditions she witnessed.
7
the settlement agreement, the agreement “should not be modified in favor of either
party, absent the most compelling reasons.” Suitland Parkway Overlook Tenants
Ass’n v. Cooper, 616 A.2d 346, 349 (D.C. 1992) (internal quotation marks
omitted) (holding that the trial court erred in failing to vacate the stay of judgment
after tenant’s rent was tendered ten days later than required under the terms of a
consent judgment, which provided that failure to timely pay rent would be a non-
curable breach preventing tenant from redeeming her tenancy and entitling the
landlord to a writ of restitution, id. at 348-49). We have said that the trial court is
not “at liberty to [modify or] disregard the explicit terms of a consent judgment”
by declaring that a breach is “de minimis” and “insufficient to justify forfeiture,”
lest the court “undercut everything [this court has] said . . . about the presumptive
validity ‘and hence enforceab[ility]’ of consent judgments.” Id. at 349 (quoting
Moore v. Jones, 542 A.2d 1253, 1255 (D.C. 1988) (holding that when tenant did
not purchase property as agreed in court-approved settlement agreement, failing
which she was to move out of the premises under the terms of the agreement, the
trial court erred in denying landlord’s motion to lift the stay of judgment and in
ruling that tenant could redeem her tenancy by paying overdue rent, because that
modification of the agreement was beyond the court’s authority, id. at 1254-56)).
We have “rejected the notion that the disfavored status of forfeitures is cause to
imply an equitable authority in the trial court to modify a consent judgment.”
8
Camalier & Buckley, Inc. v. Sandoz & Lamberton, Inc., 667 A.2d 822, 826 (D.C.
1995) (internal quotation marks omitted) (remanding to allow the tenant to present
evidence of claimed timely payment under the agreement, which proof was
required to avoid lifting of the stay of judgment under the terms of consent order,
id. at 824, 827). Thus, we have declined to treat settlement agreements approved
by the court in precisely the same way as leases or other purely private agreements
between the parties. Suitland Parkway, 616 A.2d at 351.
On the other hand, this court has endorsed the principle that “equity abhors
forfeitures . . . [and] so indeed does the law.” Tsintolas Realty Co. v. Mendez, 984
A.2d 181, 186 (D.C. 2009) (internal quotation marks omitted). In Tsintolas, a
settlement agreement, which had been approved by the court, provided that tenants
had until April 30, 2008, to vacate their unit, but also provided an incentive for the
tenants to move out sooner: “if they vacated no later than March 31, and if they
gave notice to the landlord of their intention to do so no later than March 5, then
the tenants would not be required to pay rent for the month[s] of March” and April;
and “[i]f the tenants did not vacate their unit before April 1, . . . the rent for March
and April was to be subtracted from the agreed upon amount that the landlord was
required to pay the tenants under the terms of the settlement.” Id. at 184. “The
settlement agreement also contained a confidentiality provision prohibiting the
9
tenants from divulging the terms of the settlement” and providing that the landlord
“was entitled to recover the entire settlement amount from the tenants if the tenants
divulged the terms of the agreement.” Id. After the landlord refused to make the
payment specified in the agreement, the tenants, who had vacated their apartment
by April 30, moved to enforce the settlement agreement. Id. at 184-85. The
landlord claimed that the tenants had breached the confidentiality provision by
filing the agreement with their motion to enforce without causing it to be filed
under seal, and contended that “this alleged material breach by the tenants nullified
the landlord’s obligations set forth in the settlement agreement.” Id. at 185-86.
The trial court disagreed with the landlord’s contention that the tenants committed
a breach, but this court’s focus was on whether the claimed breach of the
confidentiality provision, if committed, nullified the landlord’s obligation.
We observed that “the agreement had been a matter of public record for
several weeks before the tenants filed their motion” and had been read aloud in
open court at the time it was approved, and that the landlord had taken “no action
to prevent the agreement from becoming, and remaining, a part of the case jacket.”
Id. at 186. In that context we addressed the “gravamen of the landlord’s
claim . . . that by their alleged violation of the confidentiality provision (which,
under the agreement, constituted a material breach), the tenants forfeited their right
10
to the agreed upon settlement amount.” Id. Citing the principle that “equity
abhors forfeitures,” we said that the case “falls within the ‘no harm no foul’ rule.”
Id. We held that “[s]ince [the landlord] has suffered no monetary harm from any
alleged breach [of the settlement agreement], the [tenants are] not liable and there
can be no set-off to the sum[] owed on the [settlement agreement] by [the
landlord].” Id. at 187 (internal quotation marks omitted). “In other words,” we
explained, “although adherence to the confidentiality provision was a significant
obligation imposed on the tenants by the settlement agreement, the discernable
consequences to the landlord of the tenants having attached a copy of the
agreement to the motion were nil.” Id. (emphasis added).4 We rejected the
landlord’s argument that “the lack of injury made no legal difference,” reasoning
instead that “[p]roportionality is of consummate importance in judicious
adjudication.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted).
Tsintolas guides our resolution of this case. We need not decide whether, as
the trial judge found, Ms. Cobb’s failure to be out of the premises by the March 31
at 5:00 p.m. move-out time constituted a “de minimis” breach or substantial
4
That was because “[a] citizen who examined the case jacket before the
tenants’ motion was filed would have had access to the settlement agreement, and
the filing of the motion just added a second copy. Nothing really changed.”
Tsintolas, 984 A.2d at 187.
11
compliance with the court-approved settlement agreement obligation. Rather, we
decide that Mr. Chambers was not entitled to avoid payment of the $4,000 owed
under the agreement because he did not prove or even proffer that he was harmed
by the Cobbs’ four-hour tardiness in completing the move.5 Quite the contrary, he
testified that after leaving the property around 5:00 p.m. on March 31, he did not
return until after he received an email from Ms. Cobb’s counsel on April 3. We
take this as evidence that the Chamberses did not urgently need exclusive access to
the property by the evening of March 31, and there is no evidence that Mr.
Chambers or his wife was precluded from doing anything with respect to the
property because of the four-hour delay.6 In other words, “the discernable
consequences to the [Chamberses of the four-hour delay] . . . were nil.” Tsintolas,
984 A.2d at 187.
This case is quite unlike Suitland Parkway and Moore, in which the
consequence to the landlord of the trial court’s excusal of the tenant’s late action
5
The record does not support Mr. Chambers’s assertion that the April 3,
2017, email to him from Ms. Cobb’s attorney was “evidence that [Ms. Cobb] had,
in fact, unilaterally extended the deadline in the agreement for no fewer than 3
days.”
6
We acknowledge Mr. Chambers’s argument that, under the terms of the
settlement agreement, Ms. Cobb was allowed to live rent-free on the property for
four months, but the forgone $3,200 in rent was not the result of the four-hour
move-out delay. The Cobbs’s four-hour delay did, however, excuse the
Chamberses from remitting the $4,000 to Ms. Cobb “by March 31, 2017.”
12
was to allow the tenants to preserve their tenancies, in derogation of the landlords’
bargained-for objective of ending the tenancies of tenants who were chronically
late in meeting their lease obligations. Here, there was no dispute that the Cobbs
had vacated the property and ended their tenancy by the night of March 31. And
while Mr. Chambers argues in his brief that the 5:00 p.m. move-out time was of
“vital importance,” he has proffered no reason why that was so (that might
occasion a remand for the trial court to take evidence on the issue). In this
circumstance, we decline to require the forfeiture (of $4,000) that Mr. Chambers
advocates — which, as far as the record reflects, is grossly disproportionate to any
injurious consequence of the four-hour delay — or to otherwise disturb the
judgment in favor of Ms. Cobb.
A final point: One of the recitals to the settlement agreement states the
Chamberses’ allegation that they were entitled to a “nonredeemable judgment of
possession and an eviction.” Even if Ms. Cobb’s delay in moving had entitled the
Chamberses to Ms. Cobb’s immediate eviction, the policies then surrounding
eviction in the District of Columbia would have precluded an eviction on March
31. Under the eviction procedures of the U.S. Marshals Service as of March 31,
2017, no evictions would be completed “when a 50% or greater chance of
precipitation is forecasted for the next 24 hours.” U.S. MARSHALS SERVICE,
13
https://www.usmarshals.gov/district/dc-sc/general/evictions.htm (last visited July
25, 2018). Mr. Chambers does not contest that it was raining on March 31, 2017,
(and, per Monique’s testimony it was also windy and stormy that day). If, as the
motion judge appeared to accept, it was raining that evening, that is a “most
compelling reason[],” Suitland Parkway, 616 A.2d at 349 (internal quotation marks
omitted), to avoid the forfeiture that Mr. Chambers urges.
Wherefore the judgment of the Superior Court is
Affirmed.