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270 A.D. 988

Friedman v. Roseth Corp.

Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York · decided 1946-06-14

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““If an employment contract and breach are established, plaintiff will prove a cause of action, regardless of malice or conspiracy, and if he fails to prove a contract and breach, he cannot, on the allegations of the complaint, make a cause of action out of malice or conspiracy. The allegations of malice and conspiracy are, therefore, inconsequential or insufficient.” 270 App.Div. at 989 , 62 N.Y.S.2d at 665 .”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 290 F. Supp. 285 - Savarin Corporation v. National Bank of Pakistan

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1946-06-14

How this case has been cited

Cited by 4 later decisions — most recently September 1978

1 district ·

201946195019601970decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

Per Curiam.

¶1The first cause of action against, three corporate and three individual defendants charges all the defendants with breach of alleged employment contracts between plaintiff and all the defendants. The second cause of action against 'the same defendants repeats and realleges the allegations of the first cause of action with the additional allegation that the breach was maliciously committed in furtherance of a conspiracy.

¶2The complaint is involved and. difficult to analyze, but as plaintiff may be able to prove a cause of action thereunder, the first cause of action should be permitted to stand trial. In so ruling, we are not passing upon the construction of the agreements set forth or determining their purport or effect, but are leaving to a trial on all the evidence the determination of whether there was an employment contract, its term, if any, and whether there were breaches on the part of the defendants entitling plaintiff to damages.

¶3The second cause of action achieves no separate identity as a cause of action by virtue of the added allegation that the acts of the defendants were done maliciously and in pursuance of a conspiracy. If an employment contract and breach are established, plaintiff will prove a cause of action, regardless of malice or conspiracy, and if he fails to prove a contract and breach, he cannot, on the allegations of the complaint, make a cause of action out of malice or conspiracy. The allegations of malice and conspiracy are, therefore, inconsequential or insufficient.

¶4The orders should be modified by granting the respective motions to dismiss the second cause of action of the complaint and as so modified affirmed, without costs.

¶5Martin, P. J., Cohn and Peck, JJ., concur; Dore and Callahan, JJ., dissent in part and vote to dismiss the second cause of action as against the corporate defendants only.

¶6Orders modified by granting the respective motions to dismiss the second cause of action of the complaint and as so modified affirmed, without costs. Settle orders on notice.

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