Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Appellate Law Blogs -> North Carolina Appellate Blog

Appellate Law

: North Carolina Appellate Blog

COA Allows Partnership Dispute To Proceed

By Sean E. Andrussier

Yesterday in a href="http://www.aoc.state.nc.us/www/public/coa/opinions/2008/080578-1.htm"span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"Wiggs/span v. span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"Peedin/span/a the NC Court of Appeals (span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"COA/span) reversed the trial court's grant of summary judgment for a defendant (span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"Peedin/span) who denied the existence of a partnership formed by her late husband and argued that any such partnership dissolved upon his death and couldn't be imputed to her.br /br /Plaintiffs contended that span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"Peedin's/span late husband formed an oral partnership with them to develop land for use as a hog farming business. The farm operated for years before her husband's death. When he died, she denied them access to the land. She denied that her late husband ever formed a valid partnership with plaintiffs.br /br /The span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"COA/span held there was a genuine issue of material fact as to whether her late husband formed a valid partnership with plaintiffs, noting that a partnership may be formed by oral agreement and also by parties' conduct. Having so found, the span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8"COA/span next addressed Peedin's argument that the partnership span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"must've/span dissolved upon his death and couldn't be imputed to her. The span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10"COA/span held that summary judgment was inappropriate, finding a genuine issue of material fact as to whether span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11"Peedin/span should be held to be plaintiffs' partner under the doctrines of partnership by span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12"estoppel/span or apparent authority applied, based on her spoken words to plaintiffs and their continued conduct with respect to the hog farm's operation after her husband's death. For example, according to one plaintiff, span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15"Peedin/span made several comments to that plaintiff (which Peedin denied) indicating that the hog farm "would go just like it was."

Full post as published by North Carolina Appellate Blog on December 17, 2008 (boomark / email).