A local pool hall owner lost a $650,000 award in his civil suit against Gendron Realty.
By Lisa Chmelecki
Staff Writer

AUBURN – The owners of a local realty company were spared having to pay $650,000 to a local pool hall owner after the jury that awarded the hefty sum was declared biased and a new jury concluded that the realty company did nothing wrong.

Tom Bureau had been planning to reopen his pool hall with the money that he was initially awarded in his case against Del and Dave Gendron of Gendron Realty.

Bureau sued the father-son team last year, claiming that his Lisbon Street business failed because they rented him a space without telling him about construction planned for the area.

The case went to trial for the first time in October.

The jurors assigned to the trial found the Gendrons guilty of breaching their contract with Bureau and ordered them to reimburse him for the money he invested in the Lisbon Street business, as well as profits that Bureau claimed he could have made if his business didn’t fold.

But the verdict didn’t stand for long.

A lawyer for the Gendrons asked for a new trial on grounds that the jury was tainted by biased comments made by one juror. A Superior Court judge agreed and ruled that the verdict must be discarded.

Second trial

A second trial was held last week. This time, the eight jurors decided the Gendrons do not owe Bureau anything.

The elder Gendron is relieved that his company’s name has been cleared.

“In 50 years of business, we’ve never been sued and we’ve never sued anybody,” Del Gendron said.

For Bureau, the second decision was a disappointment but not a reason to give up. His attorney, Tom Hallett of Portland, plans to file an appeal.

“We both knew going into this that it would be a tough haul for us,” said Bureau, explaining his belief that do-over trials rarely render the same verdict as the first trial.

Hallet said he was at a disadvantage at the second trial because he was only allowed to argue his claim that the Gendrons breached their contract. Claims of fraud and misrepresentation were thrown out in the middle of the first trial, and Hallett was barred from bringing them up again.

Construction

The ordeal began in 1993 when Bureau began looking for a new location for his pool hall, which he opened on Main Street in 1991. He eventually decided to rent 1185 Lisbon St., a commercial building owned by Gendron Realty and currently home to Governor’s Restaurant.

Bureau signed the lease on Oct. 3, 1994.

At the time, Bureau claimed, the Gendrons failed to tell him about the state’s plans to take a portion of the property by eminent domain in order to widen Lisbon Street.

The pool hall opened on Nov. 22, 1994. Bureau claimed it was an instant success until the following spring when the state took 22 of his parking spaces and construction on Lisbon Street began.

Bureau claimed that the construction slowed business down so much that he had no choice but to shut down on September 1995. He sued the Gendrons a few years later.

The case went to trial in late October. After both sides presented their cases and the jury was ready to begin deliberations, the forewoman told the judge about comments one juror made to two others.

In addition to talking about his past experiences with the company’s owners, the juror reportedly shared his opinion that Del Gendron was extremely wealthy and could afford to pay a big award.

After leaning about the comments, Justice Thomas E. Delahanty dismissed the one juror and allowed the others to begin their deliberations. But the Gendrons’ attorney requested a new trial, arguing that removing the one juror wasn’t enough.

lchmelecki@sunjournal.com