Hunt Oil Co. v. Berry, 39902
| Decision Date | 19 March 1956 |
| Docket Number | No. 39902,39902 |
| Citation | 86 So.2d 7,227 Miss. 234 |
| Parties | HUNT OIL COMPANY v. F. C. BERRY, Sr. |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
Jones & Stratton, Brookhaven, for appellant.
James B. Sykes, Mendenhall, Satterfield, Ewing, Williams & Shell, Jackson, for appellee.
The appellee filed his original bill against the appellant in the Chancery Court of Simpson County seeking the partial cancellation of an oil, gas and mineral lease executed by the appellee and his wife to the appellant dated April 15, 1944, and seeking the partial cancellation of a purported amendment to said lease dated January 12, 1954, and seeking the recovery of damages in the sum of $17,340 alleged to have been sustained by the appellee as a result of disparagement of appellee's title caused by the assertion by the appellant of mineral rights under said amendment, which amendment it was alleged was procured by legal fraud perpetrated upon the appellee by the appellant's agent. After a full hearing, the chancellor rendered a decree cancelling the aforesaid lease and amendment insofar as the same related to all lands in the lease described except 40 acres of land described as the NW 1/4 of the NW 1/4 of Section 1, Township 9 North, Range 19 West, Simpson County Mississippi, and awarding to the appellee damages in the sum of $12,460. From this decree, the appellant prosecutes this appeal.
Some of the essential facts are undisputed. The appellee was the owner of approximately 620 acres of land in Simpson County, Mississippi. On April 15, 1944 he and his wife executed an oil, gas and mineral lease on said land to the appellant. The lease was for a primary term of ten years and contained a pooling agreement authorizing the lessee to pool any part of the leased acreage with other lands in the immediate vicinity thereof in a unit or units of not exceeding 40 acres each, and further providing that if production should be found on the pooled acreage, it would be treated as production from the leased acreage. On January 12, 1954, the appellee and his wife, at the instance of appellant's agent, W. K. Murphy, executed an amendment to the aforesaid lease amending the pooling clause therein so as to eliminate the restriction as to the size of the pooled unit, and forthwith filed said instrument for record. The cancellation of the lease and the aforesaid amendment was sought as to all of the land in said lease described except 40 acres described as the NW 1/4 of the NW 1/4 of Section 1, Township 9 North, Range 19 West. After the execution of the aforesaid amendment, the aforesaid 40 acres were pooled by the appellant in a unit of 320 acres and included in Gwinville Gas Unit 68, Styled 'M. O. Berry, et al., No. 1.' A well was actually drilled upon the land other than that of the appellee in this unit and completed as a producer on March 29, 1954, The said 40 acres of land belonging to the appellee and included in said unit were located about 3 1/2 miles from the center of the Gwinville Field.
The drilling of a well in the immediate area of the lands of the appellee was began on April 5, 1954, and was in the process of drilling when the primary term of the aforesaid oil, gas and mineral lease expired on April 15, 1954. This well was completed as a dry hole on April 29, 1954.
On April 23, 1954, Earl R. Wilson obtained from the appellee and his wife a lease on 180 acres of the land included in the aforesaid oil, gas and mineral lease dated April 15, 1944 at $30 per acre, and on the execution of said lease to the said Earl R. Wilson, he gave his draft to the appellee for $5,400. Discovering immediately thereafter that there was of record the amendment obtained by Murphy and that the entire lease executed by the appellee and his wife to the appellant was in effect by reason of the production on the unit styled 'M. O. Berry, et al., No. 1,' he recalled his draft and cancelled the transaction. The appellee in this suit seeks recovery of said sum of $5,400 as damages, as well as recovery for the difference in the market value of oil rights before and after the dry hole came in as to the balance of the land described in the aforesaid lease dated April 15, 1944.
The appellant first contends that the court was without jurisdiction because of the absence of a necessary and indispensable party, namely, Mrs. Etta Berry. It is the position of the appellant that Mrs. Berry, as one of the lessors in the lease dated April 15, 1944, was the owner of royalty rights thereunder and that she was, therefore, an interested and indispensable party to the action to cancel the said oil, gas and mineral lease. It was alleged in the original bill of complaint that the appellee, F. C. Berry, Sr., was the owner of the land involved. This allegation was broad enough to include the ownership of the entire title to the land, including all estates therein, as well as all mineral and royalty rights therein. The appellant in its answer expressly admitted this allegation of the original bill. Under the allegations of the bill and the admissions of the answer, it is, therefore, to be taken as true that the appellee was the sole owner of the land and all mineral and royalty rights therein. It follows, under the allegations of the bill and the admissions of the answer, that Mrs. Etta Berry was not the owner at the time of the institution of the suit of any mineral or royalty rights in the land in question or the owner of any interest in the land, and hence was neither a necessary nor proper party to the proceeding.
It is further disclosed by the record that the appellant's contention that the court was without jurisdiction because of the absence of a necessary and indispensable party was not made in the trial court and that the point was not raised as a matter of fact until raised on this appeal. It further appears from the record that F. C. Berry, Sr. and his wife, Mrs. Etta Berry, have filed in this Court a document wherein Mrs. Berry disclaims any interest in this proceeding or in the subject matter of this suit, and wherein she asserts that she has no interest in the subject matter of the suit and had none at the time of the filing of the suit, and agrees to be bound by any decree rendered in this cause. Nevertheless, the aforesaid document incorporates therein a motion that the said Mrs. Berry be made a party to this suit. It is not necessary for us to pass upon the propriety of the filing in this Court of the document mentioned, nor is it necessary for this Court to resort to a consideration of that document and of Mrs. Berry's disclaimer, since under the allegations of the bill and the admissions of the answer it definitely appears that Mrs. Berry is not now, and was not at the time of the filing of the suit, the owner of any interest in the lands in question or the mineral and royalty rights therein, and is not a necessary and indispensable party to the suit. We are of the opinion, therefore, that there is no merit in this contention. There being no necessity for the motion that Mrs. Berry be made a party, the said motion is overruled.
It is next contended by the appellant that the representations, if any, made by Murphy in procuring the amendment dated January 12, 1954 were not such as to constitute a legal fraud in the procurement of the document, and that the evidence is insufficient to support the chancellor's finding that said document was procured through misrepresentation amounting to a legal fraud. The evidence as to the circumstances under which the appellee and his wife signed the amendment dated January 12, 1954 was conflicting. The chancellor by his decree found as true the evidence introduced on behalf of the appellee on this issue. The proof for the appellee on this issue was substantially as follows:
Murphy, the admitted agent of the appellant, came to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Berry on January 12, 1954. He first contacted Mr. Berry, who was engaged at the time in an effort to extinguish a fire just across the road from his home. Murphy informed the appellee that he had a document which he wanted him and his wife to sign. He told the appellee that the Hunt Oil Company, his employer, wanted to form a unit of 320 acres embracing therein the NW 1/4 of the NW 1/4 of Section 1, Township 9 North, Range 19 West, comprising 40 acres, which 40 acres was a part of the land covered by the oil, gas and mineral lease dated April 15, 1944. The appellee made specific inquiry of Murphy as to whether or not the instrument in question included any of the other land in the lease. Appellee knew that the primary term of the lease would expire on April 15, 1954, and by signing the proposed instrument in question he did not want to affect any of the other land in the lease, but he was willing to include in the pooled unit the aforesaid 40 acres. Murphy told the appellee, and also later told the appellee's wife after they had gone into the house, that the instrument in question included no other land in the lease except the aforesaid 40 acres. Murphy started to read the instrument to the appellee and the appellee asked him just to explain the instrument to him as he knew little about such matters and couldn't understand it by a reading of it. Murphy then, according to the appellee's proof, explained the instrument to the appellee and later to his wife, assuring both of them that it had no application to any land in the lease other than the 40 acres in question. Murphy admitted in his testimony that after he had obtained the signature of the appellee and his wife to the document and left with it, he left the appellee and his wife under the understanding that the instrument in question did not apply to any land in the lease other than the 40 acres referred to. This evidence on the part of the appellee was sought to be contradicted in part by Murphy but the chancellor resolved all conflicts in the evidence in favor...
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