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Recorded verdict summary
Contractor misses the patio start: Customer wins $400, but not the full deposit
This decision was delivered in a fictional Legal Arena proceeding. It is not a real court judgment or legal advice.
A full judgment was not saved for this case. The original verdict summary is shown below.
You win partial relief. Under Rule 11, once you showed the $600 deposit was withheld and challenged the basis for keeping it, the other side needed to justify the deduction with itemization, actual costs, or specific condition evidence, and this record does not show that. Rule 9 does not support any deduction here because there is no specific damage claim at all. At the same time, this is not a classic rental deposit case, and under Rules 21 and 22 the record does not clearly establish a contract term making the full deposit automatically refundable upon a missed June 8 start. The written June 8 text and the later weather-delay explanation support your challenge to the withholding, but the proof is not strong enough to award the full $600 with confidence. The Court therefore awards a reduced return of $400.