Supreme Court to hear appeal of Marterella lawsuit

Gerry and Kate Marterella finally got some good news. The Virginia Supreme Court decided to hear the Warrenton couple’s appeal in a four-year court battle over their right to sell wine at their farm winery. No specific date has been set, but their longtime attorney Bob Zelnick anticipated the hearing will be scheduled for June.

“This is a big deal,” Gerry Marterella said Wednesday. “It is bigger than [just] us.”

The couple has always maintained that the outcome of the case has potential ramifications not only for them, but for farm wineries throughout the state.

The case began back in 2008, when the Bellevue Landowners Council [BLOC] which is the homeowners association in the Marterella’s neighborhood, sued the couple to prevent them from selling wine on their property. The BLOC claimed the sales were a commercial activity, prohibited under the rules governing land use in the community.

Conversely, the Marterellas argued the sales are an integral part of the agricultural activity that is permitted. A jury sided with the Marterellas in 2009, but Circuit Court Judge Jeffrey W. Parker set the verdict aside, siting a lack of evidence to back the Marterella’s claims that the BLOC waived its right to enforce the covenants or enforced them selectively.

Last year, Parker granted an injunction forcing the Marterellas to halt wine sales on their property.

The Virginia Supreme Court received the Marterellas’ appeal in September and Gerry Marterella said a subpanel agreed the appeal should be heard based on four elements of judicial error in the lower court.

“We are very happy,” Zelnick said. “Statistically speaking, a minority of appeals are awarded. We are cautiously optimistic [about the outcome of the hearing].”

Daniel Streich, the Fairfax attorney representing the BLOC declined to comment other than to say that the case continues.

Meanwhile, Kate Marterella said her immediate concern is to see if the bond amount can be reduced so the farm winery can reopen.

The Marterellas said they were initially supposed to post a $5,000 bond in order to keep the farm winery open pending the results of the appeal.

But they said Parker never entered that order prior to the May 12 deadline last year. In June, Parker signed an order awarding more than $99,000 to cover the BLOC’s legal costs. When he did, he included the legal fees in the bond, Gerry Marterella said.

In essence that meant the couple had to post a $105,000 bond in order to continue operations while the case is appealed.

The Marterellas said they simply couldn’t afford to do that and closed the farm winery last summer.

As a stopgap measure, Kate Marterella has been selling wine at weekend wine tasting events at Shelf Life in Old Town Warrenton since October.

“It’s a way to move a little wine and keep our name out there -– but most of the people who have been coming are former clients, they are not new people,” Kate Marterella said.