Buyer Who Did Not Negotiate Price Was Not Taken to the Cleaners
April 1, 2015In this complex fraud case involving the purchase of a dry cleaning business, the Court of Appeal upheld the trial court’s granting of a directed verdict in the defendant’s favor because, among other things, the plaintiff did not identify a fraudulent statement. The plaintiff alleged that, in the course of purchasing a dry cleaning business, the defendant purportedly asserted that the price offered to the plaintiff was “fair, reasonable, and supported by a valid appraisal.” However, the court found that there was no evidence that the defendant made any such statement. Indeed, the plaintiff testified that she did not negotiate the price of the business and was simply told that the price of $1.6 million was a take-it-or-leave-it number.
