P'NINAT MISHPAT: A Mess of Loans, Repayments and Grievances – part II | Beit Din Eretz Hemda - Gazit | Beit Midrash

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Case: The plaintiff (=pl), a lawyer, worked for and had intricate financial connections with the defendant (=def). There are two loan contracts of pl lending 250,000 NIS to def, which seem basically confirmed by bank transfers. Def made several significant payments to pl, but the sides dispute the nature of several of them, with possibilities including payment of salary. Def also has claims on rental fees at his offices from which pl continued to work after his employment ended, as well as deductions for various grievances about pl’s flawed work. [We will deal with different issues in installments.]
There is a sum of money (10,400 NIS) which def claims he paid to someone according to pl’s request, and pl denies that any such payment was related to him. Also, def claims that pl cannot get payment based on the first contract because it was due several years ago.

Ruling: Disputed repayment: This dispute needs to be decided by the halachic rules of conflicting claims. When one denies owing money, including due to repayment, but admits to part of the claim, he needs a Torah-level oath to be exempt. The gemara (Bava Metzia 4a) extends this denial to where witnesses attest to his owing part of the money. The Terumot (VII:3:2), accepted by the Shulchan Aruch/Rama (Choshen Mishpat 75:5), extends this to cases where the defendant claims his payments add up to an exemption, but beit din discovers a miscalculation, so that he is actually partially obligated.
Def claims that he owes no money to pl based on payment and counterclaims. However, he never demonstrated how the payments indicate full exemption. Although his counterclaims of damage payments cover the full amount, these claims are rejected by beit din (to be discussed), and since these counterclaims are unrelated to pl’s claims, if they are not accepted, it follows that part of pl’s claim remains owed and creates an oath obligation (see Shach, CM 75:19).
In our days, when beit din does not allow oaths, exemption with an oath is replaced by partial payment. Some speak of a set rate, whereby payment of half the claim replaces a Torah-level oath, but most poskim adjust the rate based on circumstantial evidence that makes one claim more believable than the other. Def was able to be very exact on the particulars of the payment. On the other hand, the obligation to swear would make oaths necessary on other parts of the claims. Therefore, we will assume payment of only 3,500 NIS out of 10,400 NIS regarding this payment.

P'ninat Mishpat (822)

Beit Din Eretz Hemda - Gazit

843 - P'NINAT MISHPAT: A MESS OF LOANS, REPAYMENTS AND GRIEVANCES – PART I

844 - P'NINAT MISHPAT: A Mess of Loans, Repayments and Grievances – part II

Old Contract: Unlike in secular law, Halacha does not fundamentally accept statutes of limitation (Shulchan Aruch, CM 98:1). There are circumstances under which a woman who does not sue for her ketuba after 25 years of widowhood loses the ability to receive it (see Ketubot 104a). However, that is when there is special reason to expect that she was mochelet the right; it does not apply to a loan with a contract. There are times when delay in asking for money is suspicious, which causes beit din to be careful before honoring it (Shulchan Aruch, CM 98:2). In any case, here the sides have been arguing in courts about these loans for years, and therefore there is no reason to suspect mechila or for suspicion based on the passage of time.

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P'ninat Mishpat