Crouch v. Pixler
| Citation | 83 Ariz. 310,320 P.2d 943 |
| Decision Date | 05 February 1958 |
| Docket Number | No. 6542,6542 |
| Parties | William J. CROUCH, Appellant, v. H. A. PIXLER and H. D. Pixler, dba H. A. Pixler & Son, Appellees. |
| Court | Supreme Court of Arizona |
Neil C. Clark, Phoenix, for appellant.
Stokes, Bagnall & Moring, Collidge, for appellees.
This is an action filed by plaintiffs based upon a written contract whereby plaintiffs agreed to drill a well on the land of the defendant. Plaintiffs alleged full performance of the contract, an indebtedness of $2,500 due, and reasonable attorney's fees in accordance with the terms of the contract. Judgment was rendered in favor of the plaintiffs for the sum of $2,500 as damages for the breach of contract and $800 as attorney's fees, and from such judgment and order denying a new trial defendant appeals.
The written contract entered into between the parties was admitted in evidence during the trial, and the portions material to this appeal read as follows:
'3. That said well or wells shall be drilled to depth not to exceed 1,000 feet; when any well has been drilled to a depth of 800 feet then the owner may at any time before its completion stop further thereon by notice in writing to the Contractor.
'5. It is understood by both parties that neither can tell just what will be found underneath the surfact of the earth and that the work of the Contractor hereunder is subject to those conditions which he may find underneath the surface.
'8. As compensation, the Owner shall pay to the contractor for performing his part of this contract the following schedule of prices
'For drilling, casing, perforating, and sanding @ $15.00 per foot. 'said compensation to the Contract shall be paid as follows:
The plaintiffs were paid the sum of $5,000 upon completion of drilling to a depth of 400 feet, as provided in the contract, and continued drilling to a depth in excess of 500 feet when they stopped the drilling for the reasons hereinafter set forth, demanding the additional sum of $2,500 from the defendants as full payment under the contract.
The first question presented is whether full performance of the contract is a matter of law for the court to construe or one of fact for the jury. The trial court submitted this question to the jury upon two special interrogatories:
'Did plaintiff fully perform all the requirements under the contract in a good and workmanlike manner?'
If your answer to interrogatory No. 1 has been in the negative then what damages has the defendant or counter-claimant suffered as a proximate result of plaintiffs' failure to fully perform the requirements under the contract?'
The jury answered interrogatory No. 1 in the affirmative.
Defendant strongly urges there is no conflict in the evidence and that the trial court erred in submitting the issue of full performance of the contract to the jury. We have examined the evidence and the contract, and find several conflicts in the evidence as to the material issue of performance. The contract is unambiguous as to the undertakings of the plaintiffs which required that the well shall be drilled to a depth not to exceed 1,000 feet; or when the well was drilled to a depth of 800 feet the defendant had the right at any time before completion to stop further work upon giving notice; and it was agreed by the parties that no good purpose would result from drilling rock formation in place and the plaintiffs were not required to drill rock formation in place deeper than necessary to determine its character.
Plaintiffs' evidence established that acid igneous rock of a granitic nature was encountered at a depth of 495 feet and the defendant was informed thereof; and that the rock was test-drilled for several days, to an additional depth of 20 feet. The nature of the rock was corroborated by the testimony of a mineralogist for the Arizona Bureau of Mines at the University of Arizona, who described it as hard or solid rock and entirely different from a conglomerate formation. Plaintiffs then notified the defendant that they were not required under the contract to drill further, but they would do so if a new agreement was made based on an hourly rate. No new agreement was made and plaintiffs moved their equipment to another site.
Subsequently defendant successfully drilled and completed the well with his rotary rig, which is a different type than the churn drill used by plaintiffs. The defendant testified that as a result of his drilling the formation encountered was not rock in place but a conglomerate composed of cemented gravel and sand, and that some of it was hard and some of it soft.
It is apparent that an issue of fact was created as to whether plaintiffs had fully performed the contract when they ceased drilling upon encountering hard rock in place. There is no need to set forth in detail other conflicts in the evidence, but it will suffice to state from an examination of the evidence that clearly a conflict existed as to the manner in which the well was drilled, whether the hole drilled was in a straight line, and whether the well was perforated as provided in the contract. Consequently the case cited by defendant in support of the...
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Thompson v. Harris
...that he did neither and that the court merely awarded the amount as being reasonable. This is not permissible. Crouch v. Pixler, 83 Ariz. 310, 320 P.2d 943 (1958); Ives v. Lessing, 19 Ariz. 208, 168 P. 506 The judgment of the trial court is affirmed except as to that portion awarding $150 f......
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Gametech Intern. v. Trend Gaming Systems, L.L.C.
...its attorneys' fees provided Trend demonstrates sufficient proof exists to determine what is a reasonable fee. Crouch v. Pixler, 83 Ariz. 310, 315, 320 P.2d 943, 946 (Ariz.1958). What constitutes a reasonable fee depends on the type of case involved and the nature of the evidence presented.......
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Elson Development Co. v. Arizona Sav. & Loan Ass'n, 8457
...amount alleged as reasonable in Arizona Savings's complaint put this question at issue to be determined by the court. In Crouch v. Pixler, 83 Ariz. 310, 320 P.2d 943, we '* * * the courts generally hold that to justify a finding of reasonable attorney's fees there must be evidence in suppor......
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Concannon v. Yewell
...and by virtue of the fact that there was no rental due to plaintiff. The facts before us are very similar to those in Crouch v. Pixler, 83 Ariz. 310, 320 P.2d 943 (1958), wherein our Supreme Court '. . . where an action is brought upon a written contract as in the present case, which provid......