Justia Montana Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

In 2010, plaintiffs and Tidyman’s Management Services Inc. (TMSI) filed a complaint against Michael A. Davis and John Maxwell in their capacities as officers and directors of TMSI and/or its subsidiary, Tidyman’s LLC, alleging breach of corporate duties arising out of a merger between TMSI and SuperValu, which created Tidyman’s LLC. Plaintiffs requested punitive damages and attorney fees. The merger at issue occurred despite advice from a financial advisor TMSI had retained that the company should be sold, and the complaint alleged that the directors and officers had misrepresented the merit of the transaction. TMSI is a Washington corporation with its principal place of business in Montana, and was a member of Tidyman’s LLC; employee shareholders owned TMSI. A corporate liability insurance policy was in place that purported to insure Davis and Maxwell against liability incurred in their positions as officers and directors of Tidyman’s LLC. The Policy was to provide a legal defense for Davis and Maxwell throughout the federal ERISA litigation. The issues this case presented to the Montana Supreme Court were: (1) whether the District Court was correct in concluding Montana law, rather than Washington law, applied in this case; (2) whether the District Court erred in concluding that the corporate liability insurer breached its duty to defend without analyzing coverage under the policy; (3) whether the District Court erred in denying the insurer a hearing and discovery on reasonableness and collusion related to the stipulated settlements; and (4) whether the District Court erred by awarding pre-judgment interest, or in its determination of when the interest began accruing. The Montana Court concluded that genuine issues of material fact regarding reasonableness precluded summary judgment on the amount of the stipulated settlements. Accordingly,the Court reversed judgment on the stipulated settlements and remanded this case for further proceedings. The Court affirmed on all other issues. View "Tidyman s et al. v. Davis et al." on Justia Law

The Montana Department of Revenue ("Department") appealed a judgment reversing the State Tax Appeal Board's ("STAB") conclusion that the Department had applied a "commonly accepted" method to assess the value of PacificCorp's Montana properties. At issue was whether substantial evidence demonstrated common acceptance of the Department's direct capitalization method that derived earnings-to-price ratios from an industry-wide analysis. Also at issue was whether substantial evidence supported STAB's conclusion that additional obsolescence did not exist to warrant consideration of further adjustments to PacifiCorp's taxable value. The court held that substantial evidence supported the Department's use of earnings-to-price ratios in its direct capitalization approach; that additional depreciation deductions were not warranted; and that the Department did not overvalue PacifiCorp's property. The court also held that MCA 15-8-111(2)(b) did not require the Department to conduct a separate, additional obsolescence study when no evidence suggested that obsolescence existed that has not been accounted for in the taxpayer's Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ("FERC") Form 1 filing. The court further held that STAB correctly determined that the actual $9.4 billion sales price of PacifiCorp verified that the Department's $7.1 billion assessment had not overvalued PacifiCorp's properties.