Legal Question in Civil Litigation in Virginia

Re: verbal contracts

Oral agreements are binding in most situations (except not in special situations like the sale of land or multi-year business relationships).

However, people joke that an oral agreement is not worth the paper it is written on, because it is hard to prove what was said. Unless there is a third-party witness, it is one person's word against the other. And since the plaintiff has the burden of proof, 50-50 means the plaintiff loses.

It is usually not necessary for an agreemnt to be in writing, but a writing can be EVIDENCE of the oral agreement. So in your case the email is not necessarily the contract but is EVIDENCE that there actually was an oral agreement.

Assuming the court believes he sent the email, it will probably stand up in court.

You might try sending the email back to him and asking him to keep his agreement. What he says in reply to that could (a) be an admission that he did send the email and/or (b) develop further evidence in addition to what you have already.

If anyone heard you talking with him about the agreement, that would also help.