Volume 301 — Minnesota Reports

<bold>Criminal law — trial — robbery charge — propriety of joint</bold> <bold>trial</bold>. <block_quote> In the prosecution of three defendants for robbing elderly and infirm victims, <italic>held</italic> it was proper to order a joint trial.</block_quote>

<bold>Corporations — corporate opportunity doctrine — actions</bold> <bold>prohibited</bold>. <block_quote> 1. Under the doctrine of corporate opportunity, one entrusted with the active management of a corporation, such as an officer or a director, occupies a fiduciary relationship to the corporation and may not exploit his position as an "insider" by appropriating to himself a business opportunity properly belonging to the corporation, and any property or profit so acquired becomes subject to a constructive trust for the benefit of the corporation.</block_quote> <bold>Same — corporate opportunity — improper diversion — criteria</bold> <bold>for determining when personal liability exists</bold>. <block_quote> 2. The criteria for determining whether liability should be imposed for personally diverting a business opportunity properly belonging to the corporation involve a two-step process consisting of a determination, upon a consideration of all the facts and circumstances of the case, of whether the opportunity is so intimately or closely associated with the existing or prospective activities of the corporation as to be in fact in its "line of business,"<page_number>Page 208</page_number> and whether the corporate officer, in acquiring an opportunity found "corporate," violated his fiduciary duties of loyalty, good faith, and fair dealing toward the corporation, with the burden of proof as to the first determination resting upon the party attacking the acquisition and as to the second, upon the acquiring officer.</block_quote> <bold>Same — same — finding defendant did not appropriate —</bold> <bold>sufficiency of evidence</bold>. <block_quote> 3. In this shareholder's derivative action brought by plaintiff, a minority shareholder, on behalf of defendant Miller Waste Mills, Inc., a corporation engaged in the business of high-volume manufacture of "packing waste" and "wiping waste," the trial court's findings of fact that defendants Rudolph W. Miller and Benjamin A. Miller, while in the active management and control of Miller Waste Mills, Inc., did not wrongfully appropriate to the other defendant corporations or to themselves any corporate opportunity properly belonging to Miller Waste Mills, Inc., are sustained by the evidence, and based upon the facts as found, the court's determination of nonliability is consistent with our interpretation and application of the doctrine of corporate opportunity.</block_quote>

<bold>Wills — will contest — admissibility — testimony about</bold> <bold>conversations with decedent</bold>. <block_quote> 1. In a will contest, a party or person interested in the event thereof may testify as to conversations with a person since deceased for the sole and limited purpose of laying a foundation for the giving of an opinion as to whether the decedent was mentally competent.</block_quote> <bold>Trial — trial to court — admission of inadmissible testimony</bold> <bold>— effect</bold>. <block_quote> 2. The admission or use of otherwise inadmissible testimony in a trial to the court is harmless error if the evidence is cumulative and there is other competent evidence in the case sufficient to justify the findings.</block_quote> <bold>Appeal and error — review — trial to court — affirmance</bold>. <block_quote> 3. After giving due regard to the opportunity of the trial court to judge the credibility of witnesses and considering the entire evidence in this case, there is no justification for this court's interference either on the basis of lack of evidentiary support or because of a conviction that a mistake has been committed.</block_quote>

<bold>Trial — instructions — erroneous submission of issues —</bold> <bold>effect</bold>. <block_quote> <italic>Held</italic>, in a personal injury action tried on a theory of trespass, that the trial court erred in instructing the jury on contributory negligence and assumption of risk, but that the error does not require a new trial, given the propriety of the instructions on trespass and the crucial finding by the jury that there was no trespass.</block_quote>

<bold>Teachers — termination of continuing contract due to</bold> <bold>discontinuance of position — propriety</bold>.

<bold>Teachers — probationary contract — termination — compliance</bold> <bold>with statute</bold>.

<bold>Criminal law — nonappealable order — dismissal of complaint</bold> <bold>for improper venue</bold>.

<bold>Criminal law — charge of unlawful possession of narcotics —</bold> <bold>admissibility — weapon — narcotics paraphernalia</bold>.

<bold>Damages — not inadequate</bold>.

<bold>Automobiles — negligence of driver — sufficiency of evidence</bold> <bold>of defendant's negligence</bold>.