Michel v Drakes Anchorage Ltd

• Jurisdiction: British Virgin Islands
• Court: High Court (British Virgin Islands)
• Judge: Glasgow, J.
• Judgment Date: 26 June 1972
• Neutral Citation: VG 1972 HC 7
• Docket Number: No. 9 of 1971
• Date: 26 June 1972

High Court

Glasgow, J.

No. 9 of 1971

Michel

and

Drakes Anchorage Ltd.

Appearances:

J. S. Archibald for Plaintiff

McW. Todman for Defendant

1972. March 16 ^th

1972. June 26th

Tort - Damages — Wrongful dismissal.

Glasgow, J.

1 The Plaintiff's claim against the Defendant Company is for damages for alleged wrongful dismissal from his post of General, Manager of Drake's Anchorage Hotel in the employment of the Defendant Company of Mosquito Island in the British Virgin Islands on the 3rd day of January, 1971 and for loss of salary, and for loss of the benefits of paid holiday and paid air fare back to Jamaica the place of recruitment.

2 The Defendant Company in its Defence admitted dismissing the Plaintiff from its service but stated that it did so because the Plaintiff was not reasonably competent to perform the duties of Manager of the Defendant Company's Hotel, Drake's Anchorage on Mosquito Island. The Defendant Company also counterclaimed for damages (including $11,645.00 special damages allegedly occasioned by the Plaintiff's failure to exercise lack of reasonable skill in the conduct of the Defendant Company's affairs and/or by the Plaintiff's failure, as a servant of the Defendant Company to exercise reasonable care in and about the service of the Defendant Company.

3 The material facts, as I find them, are as follows:

In February, 1970 the Plaintiff was managing director of a hotel company in Jamaica called Miranda Hall Ltd which owns the Miranda Hill Hotel, a fashionable, secluded though not isolated resort hotel containing forty deluxe rooms. The Plaintiff was also General Manager of Casa Montego Hotel situate at Montego Bay, Jamaica. The Casa Montego Hotel is a commercial hotel containing one hundred rooms. The Plaintiff had been at the Miranda Hill Hotel for four years and at the Casa Montego Hotel for a little over one year. In that month - February, 1970 - the Plaintiff was offered orally, and he accepted orally, employment in the service of the Defendant Company, as manager of the Defendant Company's hotel known as Drake's Anchorage Hotel situate on Mosquito Island in the Territory of the British Virgin Islands. The Plaintiff's salary was agreed at $24,000.00 U.S. per annum payable bi-weekly. Drake's Anchorage Hotel was at the time a small isolated hotel containing only ten guest rooms, but it was the intention of the Defendant Company to improve and enlarge the existing hotel so as to convert it into a luxury hotel containing about sixty rooms. Both parties contemplated that the entire operation of constructing, and developing the luxury hotel would take about three years. It was the Plaintiff's duty to build and develop the required hotel and to oversee its operation.

Edward Fredkin, Professor of Electrical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is the President and Director of the Defendant Company. It was Mr. Fredkin who, acting on behalf of the Defendant Company, employed the Plaintiff. Fredkin was induced to employ the Plaintiff because of the Plaintiff's excellent qualifications. The Plaintiff holds the degree of Bachelor of Science in Personnel Administration from the University of Melbourne, a Bachelor of Commerce degree also from the University of Melbourne, a Diploma in Electrical Engineering from the Technical College in Hamburg, Germany. In addition he has had twenty years experience which included resort management, public relations, promotional programmes and resort conservation and maintenance. He had also had special experience in cost control.

The Plaintiff assumed duty at Drake's Anchorage Hotel on the 16th April, 1970. Between that date and January, 1979 he received his salary of $2,000.00 U.S. every month. He also received free maintenance for himself at Drake's Anchorage Hotel to the value of $300.00 U.S. per month. The Plaintiff brought with him from Miranda Hill Hotel, Jamaica, a highly qualified French chef who was paid a salary of $600.00 U.S. per month. He employed the chef with the knowledge and consent of XYZ Inc. (the parent company in Boston), which was aware of the rate of pay. The Plaintiff also brought from Jamaica a maitre d'hotel, and he later sent for a waiter.

At the time the Plaintiff became Manager of Drake's Anchorage Hotel, Mr. Edward Fredkin was the chairman of and sole investor in a company in the United States of America named XYZ Inc., of which one Douglas Vansicklin was the president. XYZ Inc. was a management company, managing certain other companies including the Defendant Company. Another Company, Information International In which was started by Mr. Edward Fredkin, was the principal source of the funds which were to be used to develop and operate Drake's Anchorage Hotel. At the time the Defendant Company first employed the Plaintiff, Information International Inc. was doing well, but its financial fortunes declined in 1970. In addition, there was also a decline in the same year in the tourist trade in the Caribbean. The plans for the building and developing of the proposed luxury hotel had to be postponed indefinitely.

As soon as the Plaintiff assumed duty at Drake's Anchorage Hotel, he set about making the ten existing rooms more habitable: he doubled the walls to make the rooms sound-proof, he put drapes in the guest room windows, he put in reading lamps, and he put hot water in each of the rooms. When Mr. Edward Fredkin visited Drake's Anchorage Hotel in May, 1970 he complimented the Plaintiff, highly for what he had done, and he admits that the Plaintiff was improving the hotel physically a great deal. Mr. Fredkin also says that he was not dissatisfied with the standard of the food. However, Mr. Fredkin was concerned about the high cost of operating the hotel, and he told the Plaintiff so soon after the Plaintiff assumed duty. Mr. Fredkin also told the Plaintiff to find means of restricting and keeping down expenditure. The question of keeping down the running costs of the hotel was mentioned by Mr. Fredkin to the Plaintiff on more than one occasion. Statistics produced on behalf of the Defendant Company by Mr....