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STATE OF MICHIGAN COURT OF APPEALS

GARY L. CHRISTIE and PATRICIA A. CHRISTIE, Plaintiffs/CounterdefendantsAppellees, v CHARLES F. FICK and C. F. FICK & SONS, INC., Defendants/CounterplaintiffsAppellants.

UNPUBLISHED March 2, 2010

No. 285924 Crawford Circuit Court LC No. 06-007131-NZ

Before: Donofrio, P.J., and Meter and Murray, JJ. PER CURIAM. Defendants appeal as of right from a judgment for plaintiffs entered after a jury trial. We affirm. Plaintiffs had been renting and living in a cabin in Grayling from defendants since 1998, at a price of $300 a month. They claimed that defendants, in 2005, unlawfully locked them out of the premises and also moved a large quantity of valuable equipment from the cabin into storage, where it was subsequently damaged. Defendants claimed that plaintiffs were behind in rent, that plaintiffs had abandoned the premises, and that plaintiffs had numerous opportunities to retrieve their personal property after it was moved. The case was submitted to the jury on only two claims: a violation of the anti-lockout statute, MCL 600.2918, and statutory conversion under MCL 600.2919a. The jury found for plaintiffs on both claims, granting $141,500 in damages for the anti-lockout claim and $89,000 in damages for the conversion claim. The $89,000 was trebled for a total of $267,000. Damages were ultimately allowed, however, for only one of the two theories, and the jury was informed of this by way of the verdict form. The final amount of the judgment, including attorney fees and costs but excluding statutory interest, was $299,256.21.

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Defendants argue that the trial court erred in instructing the jury with regard to exemplary damages.1 Defendants contend that if a cause of action is statutorily based, exemplary damages are not allowable unless the statute specifically allows for such damages. Defendants contend that the statutes at issue here make no such allowances. Defendants further argue that a plaintiff in Michigan may not recover damages for emotional injuries allegedly suffered as a result of property damage. Plaintiffs counter that exemplary damages, as opposed to punitive damages, are awarded as an element of "actual damages" and were therefore allowable in this case because the statutes in question

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