UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 12-1352
THOMAS A. DAVIS,
Plaintiff – Appellant,
v.
MPW INDUSTRIAL SERVICES, INC.,
Defendant – Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
South Carolina, at Greenville. J. Michelle Childs, District
Judge. (6:08-cv-03286-JMC)
Argued: March 20, 2013 Decided: July 23, 2013
Before TRAXLER, Chief Judge, WYNN, Circuit Judge, and HAMILTON,
Senior Circuit Judge.
Affirmed by unpublished opinion. Judge Wynn wrote the opinion,
in which Chief Judge Traxler and Senior Judge Hamilton joined.
ARGUED: William Andrew Arnold, W. ANDREW ARNOLD, PC, Greenville,
South Carolina, for Appellant. Phillip Arthur Kilgore,
OGLETREE, DEAKINS, NASH, SMOAK & STEWART, PC, Greenville, South
Carolina, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: Jeffrey P. Dunlaevy,
OGLETREE, DEAKINS, NASH, SMOAK & STEWART, PC, Greenville, South
Carolina, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
WYNN, Circuit Judge:
In this contract dispute before us on diversity grounds,
Plaintiff Thomas A. Davis argues that the district court erred
by denying his motion for a new trial, refusing to give a
requested jury instruction, and denying him treble damages and
attorneys’ fees under South Carolina’s Wage Payment Act. We
summarily reject Davis’s arguments and affirm the district
court’s rulings in Defendant MPW Industrial Services, Inc.’s
favor.
I.
MPW is an industrial cleaning business that services South
Carolina businesses including a BMW manufacturing plant. Davis
began working for MPW in 1997, and in 2005, was promoted to
account manager for MPW’s BMW account.
On July 26, 2005, David Barrows, MPW’s Director of
Operations, met with Davis to give him a written offer for the
promotion. Jody Kerns, the former BMW account manager, had
previously discussed the position with Davis, including the
option of a 1% bonus for generating new work outside the
existing BMW account. Because the July 26 offer letter omitted
terms including the new work bonus, Barrows called Paul Bechard,
an MPW General Manager. Barrows then handwrote additional terms
on the bottom of the offer letter, including a “[n]ew work bonus
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for increase of contract at BMW.” J.A. 442. Davis signed the
letter the next day.
According to Bechard, the new work bonus in Davis’s offer
letter referred to a “project booking bonus” policy that he
developed to pay account managers a 1% bonus on growth beyond
the annual baseline budget for each account. J.A. 543.
Bechard’s draft policy defined new business as “additional
booked business beyond MPW [Facility Management] annual budgeted
revenue for that account and annual year and is considered out
of the base contract scope.” Supp. J.A. 3. Davis never saw a
copy of Bechard’s draft policy. And MPW never implemented
Bechard’s draft policy. Bechard testified, however, that he
believed Davis was owed a new work bonus.
In May 2008, MPW fired Davis after he violated company
policy by allowing other MPW employees to take his unused
vacation time. Several months later, Davis sued MPW in state
court. Davis alleged that MPW breached its contract with him
and violated the South Carolina Wage Payment Act by failing to
pay him a 1% bonus worth over $120,000 and business expenses
totaling $11,178.51.
MPW removed the case to federal court, where it was tried
in February 2011. At trial, the parties proffered contradictory
evidence indicating how the new work bonus, if it were owed,
might be calculated and what it would total. For example, Davis
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testified that the bonus should total $111,297.07. By contrast,
former BMW account manager Kerns testified that no bonus was
owed; if one was, it would total only $7,920.88 according to his
calculation. And per MPW Controller Shane DeFazio, based on
former MPW General Manager Bechard’s testimony, if a bonus were
owed, it would total either $14,240.86 or $45,131.03, depending
on the formula used.
The jury returned a verdict finding that the parties had
entered into a contract for a new work bonus, MPW breached the
contract, and Davis was entitled to a new work bonus of $14,526.
The jury denied Davis’s expenses claim. Davis moved for an
award of attorneys’ fees and treble damages under South
Carolina’s Wage Payment Act and for a new trial. The district
court denied both motions.
On appeal, Davis challenges the jury’s damages award, the
district court’s refusal to give a proposed jury instruction,
and the district court’s denial of his motion for treble damages
and attorneys’ fees. We address each issue in turn.
II.
With his first argument, Davis contends that the jury’s
damages award “was against the clear weight of the evidence and
based upon false evidence.” Appellant’s Br. at 27. Davis
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argues that the district court therefore erred in denying his
motion for a new trial on that basis.
“The decision to grant or deny a motion for a new trial is
within the sound discretion of the district court and will not
be disturbed absent a clear showing of abuse of discretion.”
Chesapeake Paper Prods. Co. v. Stone & Webster Eng’g Corp., 51
F.3d 1229, 1237 (4th Cir. 1995) (quotation marks omitted). Our
review here reveals no such “clear showing” of abuse. See id.
The main thrust of Davis’s argument: Because MPW presented
the evidence regarding the $14,526 bonus figure as proof that
there was no meeting of the minds, the jury should not have been
permitted to use it in calculating Davis’s damages. Notably,
however, Davis made no such argument at trial. Davis made no
objection to the pertinent evidence when it was introduced.
Further, Davis neglected to request a jury instruction limiting
in any way the jury’s use of the evidence supporting its $14,526
award. See Curley v. Standard Motor Prods., Inc., 27 F.3d 562
(4th Cir. 1994) (unpublished table decision) (affirming denial
of motion for a new trial where the “motion for a new trial was
based primarily on objections which were foreclosed by [party’s]
failure to object to the introduction of evidence, and [party’s]
approval of, or failure to object to the court’s instructions”).
Further, with this argument, Davis asks us to jettison the
jury’s award because it is inconsistent with the parties’
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theories of the case. Certainly, under the circumstances here,
in which the complaining party in no way attempted to limit the
jury’s use of the evidence supporting its award, “[t]hat the
jury’s verdict is not consistent with either party’s theory of
valuation is no ground for a retrial.” United States v. Smoot
Sand & Gravel Corp., 248 F.2d 822, 829 (4th Cir. 1957).
III.
With his next argument, Davis contends that the district
court’s “failure to give [his] requested jury instruction on
construing ambiguous contracts against the drafter was an abuse
of discretion.” Appellant’s Br. at 33. “Both the decision to
give (or not to give) a jury instruction and the content of an
instruction are reviewed for abuse of discretion.” United
States v. Russell, 971 F.2d 1098, 1107 (4th Cir. 1992). Through
this deferential lens, we look to “whether the district court’s
instructions, construed as a whole, properly informed the jury
of the controlling legal principles without misleading or
confusing the jury.” Hartsell v. Duplex Prods. Inc., 123 F.3d
766, 775 (4th Cir. 1997).
Upon reviewing the record, we cannot conclude that the
district court abused its discretion in refusing to give Davis’s
requested charge. First, the requested instruction cannot be
squared with Davis’s position that the contract at issue here
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was oral. Specifically, when asked in discovery to produce the
purported contract between the parties, Davis responded that
“[t]he contract was oral” and that the July 26 letter was merely
“an attempt to memorialize the oral promise of a 1% new work
bonus.” J.A. 459-460. This discovery response was entered as a
joint exhibit at trial. And Davis’s counsel confirmed at trial
that “we have an oral offer and acceptance . . . later put in
writing . . . .” J.A. 301.
South Carolina law indicates, “and the jury was so charged,
that in order to obtain relief based upon an oral contract, the
terms of a contract must be so clear, definite, certain, and
precise, and free from obscurity or self-contradiction that
neither party can reasonably misunderstand them, and can
understand and interpret them without supplying anything.”
Davis v. MPW Indus. Servs., Inc., 6:08-CV-03286-JMC, 2012 WL
527601, at *3 (D.S.C. Feb. 16, 2012) (citing Aust v. Beard, 230
S.C. 515, 521 (1957) and White v. Felkel, 222 S.C. 313, 324
(1952)). Because Davis conceded that the contract at issue was
oral, the district court clearly did not abuse its discretion in
refusing to give a jury charge on construing ambiguous
contracts. Further, to the extent Davis argues that the
contract was a hybrid oral-written contract and that the
district court erred in referring to Corpus Juris Secundum and
treating the purported hybrid contract like an oral contract,
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Davis has provided no South Carolina Supreme Court precedent
showing that the district court failed to “properly inform[] the
jury of the controlling legal principles” such that it abused
its discretion. See Hartsell, 123 F.3d at 775.
IV.
With his third and final argument on appeal, Davis contends
that the district court abused its discretion in refusing to
award him attorneys’ fees and treble damages in connection with
his new work bonus claim. Reviewing this contention for abuse
of discretion, Wall v. Fruehauf Trailer Servs., 123 F. App’x
572, 579 (4th Cir. 2005), we find none.
Section 41–10–80(C) of South Carolina’s Wage Payment Act
states that an “employee may recover in a civil action an amount
equal to three times the full amount of the unpaid wages, plus
costs and reasonable attorney’s fees as the court may allow.”
S.C. Code Ann. § 41-10-80 (emphasis added). The Supreme Court
of South Carolina has highlighted the permissive statutory
language in holding that “the penalty is discretionary with the
judge” and would be “unjust and harsh” in “those cases where
there is a bona fide dispute . . . .” Rice v. Multimedia, Inc.,
318 S.C. 95, 98 (1995). Thus, the question facing a trial court
is “whether, at the time [the defendant denied the plaintiff
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wages due], it had a reasonable good faith reason for doing so.”
Mathis v. Brown & Brown of S.C., Inc., 389 S.C. 299, 316 (2010).
In this case, there can be no doubt that a bona fide
dispute existed at the time MPW refused Davis the payments he
demanded. Davis sought “earned bonus income in excess of
$120,000” and expense reimbursements of roughly $11,000 and
claimed that both amounts were subject to the Wage Payment Act’s
attorneys’ fees and treble damages provisions. J.A. 10-11. Yet
the jury awarded Davis less than 15% of what he sought with his
bonus claim and none of his claimed expenses. After summarizing
the evidence, the district court concluded that there existed an
“inconsistency in the understanding of how the new work bonus
would be calculated and whether the bonus was properly
authorized,” such that “at the time [MPW] declined to pay a new
work bonus to [Davis], there was a bona fide dispute as to
whether [MPW] owed [Davis] a bonus, and if so, the amount owed.”
J.A. 604. With this, we cannot disagree—and we summarily reject
Davis’s various, meritless arguments to the contrary.
V.
In conclusion, we affirm the district court’s various
rulings.
AFFIRMED
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