Breach of Contract Cases

The plaintiff sought damages from the defendant town for, inter alia, breach of contract. The plaintiff worked as a police officer for the town and retired on disability in 1986 after sustaining an injury in the course of his employment. In 1985, the town had entered into a collective bargaining agreement with a union in which the plaintiff was member. At that time, federal law did not permit municipal employees to enroll in Medicare, but the law was amended thereafter to permit or require municipal employees to participate in Medicare. The 1985 collective bargaining agreement provided that union members who retired due to disability would be entitled to town paid private health insurance. In 2016, the year after the plaintiff reached the age of sixty-five, the town informed him that he would be required to enroll in Medicare and to pay the cost of his Medicare Part B premiums. The plaintiff claimed that the town was bound to provide him with town paid private health insurance under the collective bargaining agreement or, alternatively, that it was obligated to subsidize the costs of his Medicare Part B premiums. Follow- ing a trial, the court concluded that the collective bargaining agreement did not bar the town from requiring that the plaintiff transition to Medi- care, so long as the Medicare plan did not substantially reduce the benefits provided. The court also concluded, however, that the town was bound to subsidize the costs of his Medicare Part B premiums. Thereafter, the town appealed and the plaintiff cross appealed from the trial court's judgment. Held: 1. The trial court correctly concluded that the collective bargaining agree- ment did not preclude the town from terminating the private health insurance in which the plaintiff was enrolled and requiring him to transi- tion to Medicare coverage: the collective bargaining agreement did not specifically require that the plaintiff be placed, and that he remain, on the same health insurance plan as the town's

no defamation due to opinion privilege also upholding trial court's decision finding no fraud or intentional interference with business relations contract damages for wrongful dissociation adequate (and not speculative as argued in cross-appeal) insufficient evidence to support damage award for violating non-compete clause cross-appeal alleges liability for conversion against weight of evidence and improper damages for conversion value at the time of conversion rather than the replacement cost.