Rich Morton's Glen Burnie Lincoln Mercury, LLC v. Williams-Moore

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RICH MORTON'S GLEN BURNIE LINCOLN MERCURY, LLC v. JAMILA WILLIAMS-MOORE

No. 1844-2021

Court of Special Appeals of Maryland^[*]

January 12, 2023

Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County Case No C-02-CV-20-001980

Leahy Beachley, Albright, JJ.

OPINION ^[**]

ALBRIGHT, J.

This appeal arises from the sale of a used 2018 Kia Sedona automobile ("minivan"). Appellant, Rich Morton's Glen Burnie Lincoln Mercury, LLC ("Rich Morton"),^[1] sold the minivan to Appellee, Jamila Williams-Moore ("Ms. Williams-Moore"), after representing that it had "reconditioned" the minivan and could completely remove the odor Ms. Williams-Moore and her husband smelled in the minivan before Ms. Williams-Moore purchased it. After the sale, Rich Morton could not, as it had represented, remove the odor. Ms. Williams-Moore then took the minivan to an independent detail shop, which found mouse infestation inside the minivan, but could not remove the odor. Nor could a biohazard cleaning company that Ms. Williams-Moore hired. Ms. Williams-Moore then sued Rich Morton in the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County, alleging violation of Maryland's Consumer Protection Act ("MCPA") and breach of the minivan's implied warranty of merchantability, among other claims. ^[2] Ms. Williams-Moore prevailed on these claims at a bench trial, securing a judgment for $11,029.00 in damages and a second for $14,786.25 in statutory attorney's fees and costs.

Here, Rich Morton raises the following three questions:

1. Did the circuit court err in finding a violation of the [MCPA]?

2. Did the circuit court err in finding Rich Morton breached the implied warranty of the vehicle?

3. Did the circuit court err in its award of attorney's fees to [Ms.] Williams-Moore?

For the reasons below, we affirm the judgments of the circuit court.

FACTUAL BACKGROUND

In August 2020, Ms. Williams-Moore purchased the minivan from Rich Morton. Before purchasing it, she and her husband noticed animal hair in the minivan's trunk and an odor inside the vehicle, and they notified the dealership of the odor. Ms. Williams-Moore purchased the minivan for $19,582.00. Incorporated into the purchase price was a "reconditioning" fee of $1,295.00. Including various other charges, the total due was $21,087.92. Ms Williams-Moore financed the purchase with a $22,000.00 loan from an independent lender. As we discuss below, much of the case turned on various representations Rich Morton made to Ms. Williams-Moore and her husband at, and after, the time of the sale.

Two days after the purchase, Rich Morton shampooed the minivan's interior and exterior in an effort to remove the odor, but it remained. Mr. Moore then stopped driving the minivan because doing so left him with a headache and his clothes smelling. When an independent detail shop, Vega Motor Sports ("Vega"), could not eliminate the odor after one detail, Vega removed the vehicle's dashboard only to discover mouse infestation and mouse feces in the minivan's cabin air filter. Vega replaced the cabin air filter and performed an ozone treatment on the minivan, but the odor remained. Ms. Williams-Moore then had a biohazard decontamination done on the minivan, but the odor remained. By September or October 2020, Ms. Williams-Moore also stopped driving the minivan. When Rich Morton would not confirm in writing its offer to take the minivan back for the price Ms. Williams-Moore paid for it, less taxes, Ms. Williams-Moore filed the instant suit.

About five months later, Ms. Williams-Moore traded the minivan in for a preowned car at another dealership, Sheehy Nissan of Waldorf ("Sheehy"). Sheehy gave Ms. Williams-Moore $16,000.00 in trade for the minivan. In turn, Sheehy paid the $21,300.00 Ms. Williams-Moore then owed on the minivan loan and added the $5,300.00 negative trade-in value of the minivan to what Ms. Williams-Moore borrowed to buy the preowned car.^[3] Prior to this deal, Ms. Williams-Moore told Sheehy about the mouse infestation in the minivan.

At the ensuing bench trial, Ms. Williams-Moore testified, along with her husband, and Vega's operations manager, Darrel Commisiong. Ms. Williams-Moore recounted the representations Rich Morton's salesman made to her after she told him about the hair she saw and the odor she smelled in the minivan. On arriving at Rich Morton, Ms. Williams-Moore and her husband noticed ". . . dog hair, some type of animal hair" in the trunk, as well as an odor in the vehicle. After telling Rich Morton's salesman about the odor, the salesman told Ms. Williams-Moore "they could remediate the odor," adding that "this is their business. They're in the car industry. They get cars all the time with extremely bad odors, . . . smoke odors, all types of odors, and they could completely remove it."

When Rich Morton promised to give Ms. Williams-Moore a loaner car for the ride home so that it could remove the odor from the minivan, Ms. Williams-Moore went ahead with the purchase. Ms. Williams-Moore then completed the paperwork, one page of which was Rich Morton's acknowledgement that it owed Ms. Williams-Moore "reconditioning," which it itemized as "(Deodorize, Buff)." After the paperwork, though, Rich Morton told Ms. Williams-Moore that it no longer had a loaner available, but that it would bring a loaner to her home the next day and retrieve the minivan in order to clean it. As she drove home, Ms. Williams-Moore wondered if she had made the right decision in purchasing the minivan. But, she remembered the promise Rich Morton made to her -that it would clean the minivan and provide her with a loaner while the car was being cleaned.

The next day, Rich Morton did not pick up the minivan, and the minivan did not start.^[4] According to Ms. Williams-Moore, her husband spoke to Rich Morton, who assured him that it would pick up the minivan the next day. ^[5] The next day, now two days after the purchase, a Rich Morton employee arrived at the Williams-Moore home with a loaner but Ms. Williams-Moore and the minivan were not there, as Rich Morton had not called ahead with a specific time. When Ms. Williams-Moore returned home, Rich Morton picked up the minivan, and gave Ms. Williams-Moore the loaner.

When Rich Morton returned the minivan to Ms. Williams-Moore two days later,^[6]the odor remained, though it was fainter, and Ms. Williams-Moore would later observe hair in the vehicle. Ms. Williams-Moore testified, "[i]t smelled like it had just been cleaned, and there was still the faint odor of the dog smell or whatever it was ....It wasn't as strong, but it was still there. It wasn't as strong because they had just cleaned the car." In the minivan's back seat, Ms. Williams-Moore saw hair, "not that day but it was still there."

Mr. Commisiong testified about the mouse infestation Vega found in the minivan and Vega's efforts to remediate the odor. Vega detailed the minivan once, replaced the minivan's cabin air filter, and performed an ozone treatment.^[7] On removing the minivan's existing cabin air filter, Mr. Commisiong found mouse infestation, mouse feces, and mouse food, and could hear mice running inside the area of the filter. He photographed what he found, and, as he did so, noticed a sharp scent of urine. He sent the photographs to Ms. Williams-Moore and told her he had identified the source of the odor.

Later, when Ms. Williams-Moore notified Mr. Commisiong that the smell remained, he told her that with mouse infestation, there was nothing further Vega could do. Specifically, Mr. Commisiong told Ms. Williams-Moore that if the minivan had mouse infestation, Vega "cannot get in the back of the vehicle or into the clusters because mice run behind there. You know, it's [their] home. So if there's feces back there, if there's urine back there, we cannot get to it."^[8]

Mr. Moore testified that the minivan's odor was such that he refused to drive the vehicle. Specifically, Mr. Moore testified that after Rich Morton returned the minivan to them, and in an attempt to find out what was causing the odor, he drove the minivan to an auto mechanic shop about an hour and fifteen minutes away. During the drive, the smell was so strong that Mr. Moore had to wear a mask and drive with the windows down. On arriving home, according to Mr. Moore, he had a headache, "didn't feel particularly well," and his clothes "had the odor in it." At that time, he told Ms. Williams-Moore that he would no longer drive the minivan.

Rich Morton called two witnesses, Sheehy employee Keith Tunney, and Rich Morton's general manager, Donald Burke, both of whom testified about what happens when a used car is prepared for resale, among other things. Mr. Tunney testified that he was "familiar with used cars being reconditioned before sale," as that is what he did for Sheehy. During the "Sheehy Select" inspection,^[9] it is "pretty standard" to replace a vehicle's air filters, cabin filters, wiper blades, all if needed, and change the vehicle's oil. Thereafter, the car goes to the detail department "and they scrub everything, the interior, the upholstery, outside the tires, shine and wax and everything." The detail department would "remove any hairs, [perform] body and paint repairs, [and] interior technology repairs[.]"

Mr Burke testified that he was well-acquainted with the operations of a car dealership, having worked in the car business for almost 40 years and at Rich Morton for the last three years. Mr. Burke testified that inspecting a car cabin air filter was not something they "normally" do, adding that "the only time we do it" is as part of the certification process on a Mazda-certified vehicle. Instead, according to Mr. Burke, on this minivan, Rich Morton "completely shampooed the whole interior of the car," detailed the exterior, and returned the...