new position as planned, but decided on the first of december to resign and cept a positn with anotherirme heartland corpation was more than just disapinted. it had invested a great deal of time and money in training its new employee. heartland officials attempted to perade rutherford to stay, even going so far as to sweeten thoriginal deal. their efforts, however, proved unsuccessful, and finally the decision was made at corporate headquarters that the only way to hold on to rutherford was to threaten her with a lawsuit that would force her to repay the salary they'd invested in her. the question, of course, is whether or not debra rutherford was contractually bound to remain with the heartland corporation. >> the question in this case is whether ms. rutherford is contractually obligated to heartland because of an oral promise that she made to work for them. now i think we should make it clear at the outset that she cannot be forced to continue to work for heartland if she chooses not to do so. if she is contractually obligated and leaves early, she might have to pay something by way of