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IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA No. 6-237 / 05-0953 Filed May 24, 2006

FRONTIER LEASING CORPORATION, Plaintiff-Appellant, vs. JAMES RIVER COUNTRY STORE and GEORGE L. ROBERTS and MYLES GOGER, Individually, Defendants-Appellees. ________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Polk County, D.J. Stovall, Judge.

The plaintiff appeals from the district court's order granting the defendants' motion to dismiss. AFFIRMED.

Edward McConnell of Edward N. McConnell, P.L.C., West Des Moines, for appellant. James River Country Store c/o Myles Goger, pro se, Crozet, Virginia, for appellees.

Considered by Sackett, C.J., and Vogel and Mahan, JJ

2 VOGEL, J. Frontier Leasing Corporation (Frontier) appeals from the district court's order granting a motion to dismiss by the defendants, James River Country Store and George Roberts and Myles Groger individually. Because we agree with the district court that the statute of limitation on Frontier's claim has run, we affirm the order for dismissal. In October 1999, Frontier's predecessor in interest, Liberty Leasing Company, entered into an equipment lease agreement with the defendant, James River Country Store, for an ATM terminal. The agreement provided in pertinent part: Default: You will be in default under this lease if any of the following happen: (a) we do not receive any lease payment within five (5) days after its due date; (b) you or any of your guarantors break any promises in this lease or any guaranty; (c) you or any of your guarantors become insolvent, liquidate or dissolve, merge, transfer substantially all of your stock or assets, stop doing business or assign your rights or property for the benefit of creditors; (d) a petition is filed by or against you or any of your guarantors under any bankruptcy or insolvency law; (e) you or any of your guarantors dies or have a guardian appointed; or (f) without our written permission in advance, you try to move, sell, transfer, pledge, part with possession, sublet or put a lien on any equipment. (emphasis added). In February 2000, one of the guarantors under the lease, George Roberts, died. 1 The defendant ceased making lease payments on April 11, 2000. After that time, it appears that the supplier under the equipment lease, Credit Card Center (CCC)

1

Roberts was also one of the two partners of the defendant entity, James River Country Store.

3 made several payments to Liberty allegedly on behalf of the defendants, 2 two in June 2000, one in August 2000, and one in December 2000. No further

payments were made under the lease, and Liberty considered the defendants to be in default in January 2001 due to nonpayment. Frontier did not file suit against the defendants until September 30, 2004. In February 2005, the defendants filed a motion to dismiss based on the running of the statute of limitations. The district court entered its order granting dismissal based upon its finding that George Roberts's death in February 2000 constituted a default under the lease, triggering the four-year limitation under Iowa Code section 554.13506 (1999), which then ran in February 2004. Frontier appeals. We review a district court ruling on a motion to dismiss for correction of errors at law. Kingsway Cathedral v. Iowa Dept. Of Transp., 711 N.W.2d 6, 7-8 (Iowa 2006). A motion to dismiss admits the well-pleaded facts in the petition, but not the conclusions, and should only be granted if there is no state of facts conceivable under which a plaintiff might show a right of recovery. Id. Under the applicable statute of limitations, a claim for default of a lease must be filed within four years of the accrual of the cause of action. Iowa Code

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