Ranchers Exploration and Development Co. v. Anaconda Co.

• Decision Date: 22 December 1965
• Docket Number: No. C 15-63.,C 15-63.
• Citation: 248 F. Supp. 708
• Parties: RANCHERS EXPLORATION AND DEVELOPMENT CO., a New Mexico corporation, Plaintiff, v. The ANACONDA COMPANY, a Montana corporation, Topaz Beryllium Company, a Utah corporation, W. T. Hudson, Lenard Rockwell and M. G. White, Defendants, Homer U. Petersen, Phill Rawlinson and Richard D. Moody, Intervenors.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Utah

248 F. Supp. 708

RANCHERS EXPLORATION AND DEVELOPMENT CO., a New Mexico corporation, Plaintiff, v. The ANACONDA COMPANY, a Montana corporation, Topaz Beryllium Company, a Utah corporation, W. T. Hudson, Lenard Rockwell and M. G. White, Defendants Homer U. Petersen, Phill Rawlinson and Richard D. Moody, Intervenors.

No. C 15-63.

United States District Court D. Utah, Central Division.

December 22, 1965.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Calvin A. Behle, of Parsons, Behle, Evans & Latimer, H. Byron Mock and Kent Shearer, of Neslen & Mock, Salt Lake City, Utah, for plaintiff.

S. N. Cornwall and Clifford L. Ashton, of VanCott, Bagley, Cornwall & McCarthy, and Robert G. Dwyer, Salt Lake City, Utah, for defendants The Anaconda Co. and Topaz Beryllium Co.

Thorpe Waddingham and Dudley Crafts, Delta, Utah, for defendants Lenard Rockwell and M. G. White, and for intervenors.

CHRISTENSEN, District Judge.

The jurisdiction of this court properly has been invoked upon the basis of diversity of citizenship existing between the parties.

Defendants and intervenors¹ are the claimants of numerous lode mining claims spread across an area of more than five square miles of public domain lying on the west flank of Spor Mountain in Juab County, Utah. Over some of these claims plaintiff Ranchers Exploration and Development Co. attempted to locate claims of its own and to make mineral discoveries in support of such relocations. Defendants forcibly prevented the consummation of these attempts. It was then believed, and it since has been confirmed, that a major beryllium² field was involved within which numerous claims are highly valuable.

Plaintiff alleged³ that defendants, having themselves made no valid mineral discoveries, unlawfully interfered with its established rights in particular mining claims on which it had initiated locations and was in the process of making discoveries, and through conspiracy and otherwise violated its right to make further locations and discoveries, for which interference and violations plaintiff sought injunctive, declaratory and legal relief, including that afforded by the Sherman Antitrust Act, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1, 15, and comparable state statutes.

Defendants denied plaintiff's assertions that their claims were not supported by valid mineral discoveries at the time of plaintiff's entries; and defendants alleged that to the extent of any failure in this respect they were entitled to protection in the continued occupation, exploration and perfection of their claims under the doctrine of pedis possessio. Defendants asserted that in any event plaintiff was precluded or estopped from questioning or interfering with their rights by reason of conduct on the part of one Ford, with whom plaintiff was associated in the investigation and attempted acquisition of defendants' claims and to whom plaintiff later assigned an interest in any recovery from this lawsuit.

During pre-trial proceedings, in the hope of avoiding unmanageable processing for trial of numerous individual claims, six "bellwethers"⁴ were selected by the parties (three claims by each side) as presenting the major issues of fact and law likely to be encountered in deciding the validity of all of the claims in dispute. Accordingly, the trial upon which the present decision is based was confined to an investigation of these six claims and the rights of the parties concerning them. The position of the hundred or so other claims which could be affected by the ruling and all issues as to antitrust problems and damages, to the extent their consideration may become necessary, have been by agreement reserved for further proceedings.

The wide latitude which the briefs have encompassed has been helpful in permitting us to beat peripheral bushes for obscure conceptual traps. But with that done, the scene of conflict has returned to the broad but variable slopes of established principles. A discussion keyed primarily to the minutia of facts set out in the extended findings proposed by some of the parties or the plethora of comments in the decided cases, would serve only to mask the decisive points. Their solution turns not upon questions of credibility, nor upon nice distinctions in fact or law, but primarily upon the reconciliation or adjustment of competing public policies and foundational legal principles as they met head on, so to speak, during those bleak winter hours of 1963, when the armed guards of the defendants sought out, and with force turned back from the properties in dispute, the plaintiff's scrambling personnel and equipment.

From the maze of factual and legal matters which it is hoped have been adequately, if not from the standpoint of all of the parties satisfactorily, covered by the pre-trial rulings and order and by the findings of fact and the conclusions herein recited, three problems seem to warrant more extended discussion in view of their importance in the mining industry.

The first vital inquiry is whether defendants or their predecessors in interest had made "mineral discoveries" on or underlying all of the bellwether claims prior to the attempted entries by plaintiff. If so, all issues would have to be resolved in favor of defendants, for even as to its antitrust implications plaintiff concedes that such a finding, if sustainable, would be determinative against it on the whole case. If discovery previously had not been accomplished on or underlying all of such claims, defendants would be relegated to their defenses of pedis possessio and estoppel or "unclean hands", thus presenting the second and third major issues to be examined here: Whether defendants at the time of plaintiff's attempted entries were in occupation of and diligently attempting to make discovery on the claims on which mineral discoveries had not been made, within the doctrine of pedis possessio; and, if not, whether plaintiff by reason of any unconscionable conduct attributable or imputable to it should be barred from asserting whatever rights it might otherwise have possessed.

The bellwether claims are these:

Monitor No. 43. This claim was drilled by the defendant Topaz Beryllium Company in 1962. Substantial beryllium was encountered in the hole at between 400 and 500 feet in depth. No competing entry or discovery had been attempted by plaintiff, which at the trial disclaimed any interest.

South Wind No. 29. This claim is adjoined on the north by South Wind No. 30, on the east by South Wind No. 17 and on the south by South Wind No. 28, and is overlaid by G.B.C. (General Beryllium Corporation) Nos. 78, 80, 115 and 116, all being located by predecessors in interest of the defendants.⁵ The entire surface of this claim is barren of any exposed mineral or rock in place, being covered by alluvium. Prior to 1963 Ford, then working for General Beryllium Corporation, drilled a hole within South Wind No. 17, which was also within G.B. C. No. 78, and approximately 25 feet from the boundary of South Wind No. 29. Samples from this hole showed significant beryllium content. Outcroppings and surface geology to the northeast made it reasonable to infer that beryllium likely would be encountered at some depth on South Wind 29. Moody was entitled to the benefit of any information Ford or G.B.C. had concerning discoveries near or on these claims. On January 21, 1963, after they had prevented plaintiff from entering this general area, defendants drilled a hole on South Wind No. 29, which encountered beryllium bearing tuff at shallow depth. Up until the latter hole was drilled, no physical work had been done on the claim by either defendants or plaintiff, except for staking, monumenting and posting by the former. No one maintained physical possession of the claim. In January, 1963, however, Moody, at the request of Anaconda, assigned his employee Atkinson to go on occasion to the general area for the purpose of watching and, as needed, restoring claim boundaries and re-erecting monuments on the Rawlinson-Moody groups of claims. Air surveillance for possible intruders was also carried on about the time of plaintiff's entry in January, 1963, with reference to this and the other areas mentioned hereafter.

Hat No. 4. The plaintiff attempted through its agents to locate this claim in the nighttime of January 18, 1963, but was forcibly prevented by defendants from so doing after the digging of a pit for the location monument was commenced. The intended claim was covered by alluvium, there being no outcroppings except occasional limestone on the surface of the claim. At the time of plaintiff's entry the hole on South Wind No. 17, mentioned above, had been drilled, and thus the latter claim was supported by a valid discovery inuring to defendants. A small part of South Wind No. 17 overlapped the intended location of Hat No. 4. In view of surface geology to the northeast and the mineralization encountered in this hole the likelihood of beryllium bearing tuff underlying a portion of Hat No. 4 reasonably could have been inferred.

The Larry Claim. The intended boundaries of this claim brought it in conflict with portions of defendants' South Winds Nos. 2, 9 and 10, and G.B.C. Nos. 42 and 43. The surface of The Larry Claim is alluvium except for a rhyolite exposure in its northeast corner. There are also such exposures present on some of the overlapping South Wind and G.B.C. claims. Prior to 1963 Ford, acting for G.B.C., drilled a hole on South Wind No. 3 which revealed indications of fluorite, but no tuff nor beryllium was encountered. No further drilling on or in the vicinity of this claim was attempted by defendants until after plaintiff's entry. Location of and discovery on The Larry Claim was attempted by agents of the plaintiff on February 8, 1963. The location monument was placed and digging ostensibly for beryllium was commenced with pick and shovel during the morning; thereafter plaintiff's drill rig arrived at the location and commenced drilling at the location point, and...