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Central Bering Sea Fishermen's Association v. Anderson9/6/2002
No. 5623
I. INTRODUCTION
A jury awarded Susan Anderson compensatory and punitive damages against Central Bering Sea Fishermen's Association and its president, Carl Merculief, based upon her claims of constructive retaliatory discharge, promissory estoppel, and defamation. The Association and Merculief challenge various aspects of the damages awards. We agree that the jury's award of lost earnings is excessive; however, we sustain the jury's punitive damages award.
II. FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS
Central Bering Sea Fishermen's Association is a nonprofit economic development organization established by fishermen in St. Paul in the Pribilof Islands in conjunction with the community development quota program ("CDQ"). The program was instituted by the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council to allocate a portion of the fisheries' resource to the coastal villages of western Alaska. Carl Merculief was the president of the Association in 1997 and 1998.
In late 1997 Susan Anderson approached the Association about working for it as an economic development project coordinator. At the time, Anderson held a similar job with Yukon Delta Fisheries Development Association, another CDQ group. After Anderson's first interview, Merculief told her that he would like to hire her but that he needed the approval of the Association board of directors.
In January 1998 Merculief asked Anderson to start work with the Association, as Kathy Faltz, the office manager and controller, had suddenly fallen ill and Merculief needed help with the corporation's accounting. At a January 9 meeting of the Association board of directors, which Anderson attended, Merculief proposed hiring Anderson to do economic development work. After some discussion, the board agreed to hire Anderson and to pay her initially at the rate of $55,600 annually. The board also promised to give Anderson a written contract and to raise her salary to $60,000 if she successfully concluded a probationary period. The board instructed Anderson and Merculief to negotiate an employment contract to present to the board for approval after the completion of her probation.
Anderson began work on January 16, 1998. She performed some of Faltz's bookkeeping supervision and accounting duties in addition to her economic development responsibilities. Despite the burden of additional duties, Anderson performed well in her economic development work. During this time, personnel working for Anderson began to approach her to report irregularities and potential theft of Association assets by Faltz. When Anderson reported these allegations to Merculief, Merculief refused to look into the matter, citing Faltz's current illness.
In early April 1998 Anderson and Merculief negotiated a draft employment contract to present to the board. The board was to consider the proposed contract at its April 13 meeting; however, at the meeting the Association's attorney Roger DuBrock had a different version of the draft contract. The confusion over the multiple drafts of the contract was compounded by discussion of where this economic development position should be located - St. Paul or Anchorage - and whether or not the position should continue to exist if the Anchorage office closed.
Anderson explained to the board the advantages of having an office in Anchorage and told the board that she would not be able to live and work on St. Paul. Due to the confusion over the multiple contract drafts and the contingency of the position on office location, the board voted not to approve Anderson's contract at that time; however, the board nonetheless assured Anderson that she was doing a good job and
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