Cases—Statute of frauds—Plaintiff can’t use misrepresentation claim to evade statute of frauds

An employee who claimed that principals of a company had personally guaranteed his continued employment saw his case dismissed because the alleged promise was not in writing, his claim of fraud notwithstanding.

When General Cosmetics Corp. got into financial trouble, it asked its CFO, Fabrizio Scudari, to defer his wages.  Scudari claimed that two individual principals of the company had promised to make good on those wages if he stayed with the company.  He did, but did not get paid.  He sued the principals on their promise.

He styled his claim as one for fraud, claiming that he had relied on the plaintiffs’ “representation.” But Judge Richard Owen of the federal district court in Manhattan said that the basic claim was that the directors had guaranteed the payments owed by GCC.  Under New York law, such a guarantee to answer for the debt of a third party must be in writing, so his claim was dismissed.  Scuderi v. Springer, 2004 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23867 (S.D.N.Y. Nov. 23, 2004).