© 2015 The Texas Lawbook.
By Natalie Posgate
(Dec. 22) – A Rockwall jury recently ruled that a local human resources outsourcing company breached its contract with Central Freight Lines to provide workers’ compensation insurance and claims administration services.
In 10-2 ruling, the jury awarded Central Freight, a Waco-based trucking company, $1.85 million in damages. If state District Judge David Rakow decides to award interest, Rockwall-based Trendsetter HR may have to pay more than $2 million to Central Freight.
Trendsetter and Central Freight entered their contract in 2008 before adding several amendments to broaden the administrative services provided to Central Freight and its employees. For more than three years, Trendsetter accepted payments from Central Freight but failed to properly deposit the funds for workers’ compensation coverage, the jury found.
Trendsetter sued Central Freight in 2013 after the trucking company stopped payments following a series of audits and documentation demands that Trendsetter did not meet.
The next year, Central Freight countersued. The case went to a five-day trial this month and jurors deliberated for six hours before returning a verdict in favor of Central Freight.
“It’s rare to receive a verdict of this magnitude in a counterclaim, but Trendsetter’s failures and wrongs were particularly egregious,” says attorney William Chamblee of Dallas’ Chamblee Ryan Kershaw & Anderson, who represented Central Freight at trial. “Trendsetter, its affiliates and its owner made numerous misstatements to my client in an effort to hide the facts and justify their wrongdoing.”
Jonathan Davenport represented Trendsetter at trial.
“We are disappointed in the verdict and are evaluating our options for an appeal,” said Davenport, an attorney at Lewis & Backhaus in Dallas.
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