Nichols v. Mid-Continent Pipe Line Co.
| Decision Date | 15 October 1996 |
| Docket Number | MID-CONTINENT,No. 84130,84130 |
| Citation | 933 P.2d 272,1996 OK 118 |
| Parties | 136 Oil & Gas Rep. 125, 1996 OK 118 Terry NICHOLS, Doneta Nichols, Terry Brett Nichols, Quinton Dale Nichols, and Tyler Danton Wayne Kauk, a minor, by and through his father and next friend, Tony Edwin Kauk, Appellants (Counter-Appellees)/Plaintiffs, v.PIPE LINE COMPANY, Appellee (Counter-Appellant)/Defendant. |
| Court | Oklahoma Supreme Court |
Allan DeVore and Marjorie Ramana, The DeVore Law Firm, Oklahoma City, Douglas E. Burns, Oklahoma City, for appellants.
Jessie V. Pilgrim, Tulsa, for appellees.
In late 1990 Terry Nichols, one of the plaintiffs, agreed with Jerry Myers to sublease the Barnes ranch--a 1300-acre tract of land in Dewey County--and took possession of it. 1 He and members of his family [collectively the plaintiffs ] then moved their cattle onto this property. Soon after that, the plaintiffs' stock began experiencing various physical anomalies. 2 One of the veterinarians who was consulted suggested that the cattle's problems might be causally related to ingestion of hydrocarbons.
In January 1992 Nichols discovered that earlier buried substances from an Exxon Corporation [Exxon] reserve pit [used in drilling activities conducted on the Barnes ranch] had risen to the surface and that the plaintiffs' cattle were ingesting them. In February 1992 Nichols also discovered a leak in Barrett Pipeline Company's [Barrett] oil pipeline in an area where the plaintiffs' cattle had been grazing. Mid-Continent had sold to Barrett (in July 1991) the oil gathering system, which included the leaking pipeline in issue.
In early 1993 the plaintiffs brought an action (based on negligence and nuisance) for damages to their cattle and also for harm ( by the defendants' pollution) to their possessory interest in the Barnes ranch. 3 Barrett, who settled with the plaintiffs for $100,000 4, was dismissed from the action before trial, but its fault as a third party (nonparty) on the negligence-related claim was nonetheless tendered for the jury's assessment. Barrett's liability on the nuisance claim was not submitted for the trier's consideration.
After a bifurcated trial--the first phase to settle liability, the other to assess punitive damages--the jury (1) assessed comparative fault for the negligent injury to plaintiffs' cattle by allocating 10% of the $100,000 awarded in damages to the plaintiffs, 35% (or $35,000 in damages) to Exxon and 55% (or $55,000 in damages) to Mid-Continent; (2) completely exonerated Barrett of liability for harm to the cattle; (3) determined that Mid-Continent was solely liable on the nuisance claim in the amount of $150,000; and (4) assessed a $250,000 punitive-damages award against Mid-Continent alone.
At the conclusion of phase I, the court credited Exxon and Mid-Continent each with $50,000 of the Barrett settlement proceeds and reduced accordingly their respective proportionate liability (on the jury awards). When phase II came to be concluded, the trial court reduced the punitive-damages award against Mid-Continent from $250,000 to $155,000, 5 the amount of the diminished recovery for actual damages. The plaintiffs sought corrective relief from the manner in which the trial judge applied the Barrett settlement proceeds, and Mid-Continent and Mid-Continent alone sought certiorari.
Exxon appealed from the adverse judgment. Exxon settled with the plaintiffs before the cause was reached on appeal. Although sustaining the judgment, the Court of Appeals reversed the trial court's use of the Barrett settlement proceeds to reduce punitive-damages award, holding that the plaintiffs were entitled to the full amount ($250,000) awarded by the jury
PLAINTIFFS' NUISANCE CLAIM LIES FOR THE HARM OCCASIONED TO
The statutory definition of nuisance--in 50 O.S.1991 §§ 1 et seq. 6 --encompasses the common law's private and public nuisance concepts. 7 It abrogates neither action. 8 Common-law nuisance--a field of tort-like liability which allows recovery of damages for wrongful interference with the use or enjoyment of rights or interests in land 9--affords the means of recovery for damage incidental to the land possessor's person or chattel. 10
Mid-Continent, which characterizes the plaintiffs as trespassers on the Barnes Ranch, denies that they possess any rights (or interests) in the land. While there might be a legal question about the validity of the plaintiffs' sublease [an issue we need not reach today], 11 the record amply demonstrates the plaintiffs were in actual possession 12 Mid-Continent's status is that of a tortfeasor. The trustees of the Barnes Ranch, the lessors, never sought re-entry (or otherwise attempted to interfere with the plaintiffs' possession of the leased premises) at any time before the acts in this litigation had occurred. The trial court's ruling that the plaintiffs--as possessors of the land 14 fall within the class of claimants who may bring an action for private nuisance is hence legally correct.
of this acreage. A stranger to both the privity of estate and of contract--one other than the lessor-- is barred from interposing as a defense a lessee's breach of a provision that restricts lessee's right to sublet without lessor's approval. 13
We adopt today the national common-law norms found in the RESTATEMENT (SECOND) OF TORTS § 821D 15 as harmonious with this State's extant jurisprudence. 16 Both clearly allow a private nuisance claimant to recover for personal harm, inconvenience and annoyance incidental to another's interference with the possessory interest in land. There was hence no error in admitting evidence of those physical conditions suffered by Terry Nichols, which had a medically established nexus to the claimed injury.
(MID-CONTINENT'S PARENT CORPORATION) FINANCIAL
During the punitive-damages phase of the trial the plaintiffs sought to introduce evidence of Sun Company's [Sun] financial condition. Mid-Continent--a wholly owned subsidiary of Sun--objected. The trial judge ruled that there was an identity (between Mid-Continent and Sun) sufficient to permit the proof's admission. 18 This mid-trial ruling rests on competent evidence in the record, which supports the notion of Mid-Continent's The record amply demonstrates that Mid-Continent was financially capable of paying the damages assessed against it without destroying its ability to conduct business in futuro. 22 Even if it was error to adduce Sun's financial information, the admission was at most harmless.
control by its parent. 19 Moreover, Mid-Continent did not object to the proof of (a) Sun's control over its operations or (b) Sun's massive draining of Mid-Continent's assets. 20 It cannot be said that under these circumstances evidence of Sun's financial condition is irrelevant to Mid-Continent's worth--a proper concern of the jury in awarding punitive damages. 21
THE TRIAL JUDGE'S DECISION NOT TO DECLARE A MISTRIAL FOR
ALLEGED MISCONDUCT BY PLAINTIFFS' COUNSEL IS NOT REVERSIBLE
ERROR IN VIEW OF HIS FIRMNESS AND CONTROL IN DEALING WITH
THE ARGUABLY PREJUDICIAL REMARKS
In order for counsel misconduct to effect a judgment's reversal, substantial prejudice must have resulted from the remarks and the jury must have been influenced to the material detriment of the appealing party. 23 While the closing remarks of plaintiffs' counsel were couched in arguably intemperate rhetoric, 24 the trial judge correctly admonished the jury to rely solely on its recollection of the evidence rather than on counsel's own characterization of the proof. 25 If plaintiffs' closing remarks did indeed amount to misconduct, the court, by its instructions, effectively minimized their consequence and prevented substantial prejudice to Mid-Continent. Because of the trial court's remarkable and apt firmness in dealing with the erratic prose, its denial of Mid-Continent's mistrial quest cannot be viewed as reversible error. 26
BECAUSE THE JURY EXONERATED BARRETT OF NEGLIGENCE-RELATED
LIABILITY AND MID-CONTINENT FAILED TO OBJECT TO THE VERDICT
FORM, WHICH DID NOT CALL FOR A FINDING OF NON-PARTY
LIABILITY ON THE NUISANCE CLAIM, IT WAS ERROR FOR THE TRIAL
COURT TO REDUCE THE PUNITIVE-DAMAGES AWARD BY THE AMOUNT OF
SETTLEMENT PROCEEDS FROM BARRETT
Mid-Continent claims that under the provisions of 12 O.S.1991 § 832H 27 (Oklahoma's In its argument for downsizing the punitive-damages award, Mid-Continent urges that Barrett's contribution towards payment for the same harm is not mere "credit" upon the amount due the plaintiffs under their judgment but rather calls for reduction of the jury award for actual damages, which in turn entitles Mid-Continent to a corresponding diminution of the punitive-damages amount by the coercive force of 23 O.S.1991 § 9. 30 Because we cannot treat Barrett's settlements proceeds as a § 832H contribution, it is unnecessary to settle here the precise nature of that contribution's impact upon the size of a...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Beyrer v. Mule, LLC
...opinion was vacated in part and non-vacated portion "stands as the settled law of the case").16 See , e.g. , Nichols v. Mid-Continent Pipe Line Co. , 1996 OK 118, 933 P.2d 272, 281 (unsuccessful plaintiffs on an assignment of error before the Court of Appeals failed to seek certiorari to re......
-
Lockhart v. Loosen
...appellate contest. Hence, these theories of liability are now beyond the scope of our reviewing cognizance. Nichols v. Mid-Continent Pipe Line Co., 933 P.2d 272, 281 (Okla.1996); Jackson v. Jones, 907 P.2d 1067, 1074 n. 37 (Okla.1995); Morrow Dev. v. American Bank and Trust, 875 P.2d 411, 4......
-
Nealis v. Baird
...rights of an infant of similar medical status prematurely born." 112. 1976 OK 64, n. 3, 550 P.2d 924, 928, n. 3. 113. Nichols v. Mid-Continent Pipe Line Co., 1996 OK 118, ¶ 23, 933 P.2d 272, 281; Hough v. Leonard, 1993 OK 112, ¶ 15, 867 P.2d 438, 445. See also, Barnett v. Barnett, 1996 OK 6......
-
The Quapaw Tribe of Oklahoma v. Blue Tee Corp.
...OKLA. STAT. tit. 50, § 1. This general definition applies to claims for public and private nuisance. Nichols v. Mid-Continent Pipe Line Co., 933 P.2d 272, 276 (Okla.1996). public nuisance is "one which affects at the same time an entire community or neighborhood, or any considerable number ......