Western Gulf Petroleum Corp. v. Frazier Jelke & Co.

• Citation: 163 S.W.2d 860
• Decision Date: 25 June 1942
• Docket Number: No. 11413.,11413.
• Parties: WESTERN GULF PETROLEUM CORPORATION et al. v. FRAZIER JELKE & CO.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

163 S.W.2d 860

WESTERN GULF PETROLEUM CORPORATION et al. v. FRAZIER JELKE & CO.

No. 11413.

Court of Civil Appeals of Texas. Galveston.

June 25, 1942.

Rehearing Denied July 23, 1942.

Appeal from District Court, Harris County; Roy F. Campbell, Judge.

Garnishment proceeding by Frazier Jelke & Co. against the Western Gulf Petroleum Corporation and others on a judgment for plaintiff against O. R. Seagraves. From a judgment discharging garnishee as to one block of stock and holding another block of stock to be subject to the garnishment, both parties appeal.

Affirmed in part, reversed and rendered in part.

Vinson, Elkins, Weems & Francis and Fred R. Switzer, all of Houston, for appellants.

Sears, Blades, Moore & Kennerly and Fred W. Moore, all of Houston, for appellee.

GRAVES, Justice.

In a sense, the cause now at bar is a recrudescence of another one formerly here, Frazier Jelke & Co. v. Chapman Minerals Corporation, decided and reported by opinion published in 149 S.W.2d 1101; that is, it likewise involved efforts — through garnishment — by these appellees, constituting a partnership of several members, who owned the same $67,463.38 judgment against O R. Seagraves the former suit was based on, to subject two blocks of appellant — Western Gulf Petroleum Corporation's stock — one of 6000 shares of preferred, the other of 78 shares of common — standing upon its books in the name of Mrs. Florence E. Seagraves, wife of O. R. Seagraves, to such judgment they so held against her husband, upon their claim that, although all of such shares were held in the name of Mrs. Seagraves, they constituted in fact the community property of herself and her husband.

After the appellees sued out the garnishment that is here involved, on February 25 of 1939, against the Petroleum Corporation, its co-appellant herein, the Bayport Oil Corporation, about December 22 of 1939, purchased from Mrs. Seagraves and others all the stock the Petroleum Corporation had issued, including, as being the property of Mrs. Seagraves, the 78 and 6000-share blocks here involved, whereupon the Bayport Corporation, as such pendente lite purchaser, was vouched into this litigation.

In other words, in the trial court the appellees contended that all this stock constituted community property between Mr. and Mrs. Seagraves, hence was subject to their judgment against him; whereas the appellant-corporations each and both claimed that the stock was in its entirety the separate property of Mrs. Seagraves, had been at all times so held and dealt with between her and them, consequently appellees never at any time had any right to impound any part of it upon their debt against him alone.

The trial court submitted what it deemed to be the material issues raised by the pleadings and evidence over such ownership to a jury in special issues; the two inquiries most directly seeking to elicit the facts upon such ownership, as applied separately to the two blocks of stock in issue, together with the jury's answers thereto, were these:

"Special Issue No. 6.

"Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the property, if any, delivered to the Western Gulf Petroleum Corporation for the issuance of 6,000 shares of its preferred stock to Mrs. Florence E. Seagraves, was community property, as that term is defined in this charge, of O. R. Seagraves and wife, Florence E. Seagraves."

Answer: "Yes".

"Special Issue No. 8.

"Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the 78 shares of Western Gulf Petroleum Corporation common stock, issued to Mrs. Florence E. Seagraves, were paid for out of profits derived from the investment of her separate property, as that term is defined in this charge?"

Answer: "Yes".

On that verdict, the trial court decreed the 78 shares of common stock to be the community property of Mr. and Mrs. Seagraves, and to be subject to the appellees' garnishment; but, disregarding the finding under issue No. 6, that the 6000 shares was community property, decreed that, as to it, the appellants were entitled to a discharge from any liability to the appellees, upon their answers.

Both sides appeal, appellants challenging the court's action in denying them a like decree as to the 78 shares that was accorded them as to the 6000 shares, the appellees, by cross-assignment, contending that there was ample evidence to support the jury's quoted finding to the effect that the 6000 shares were also community property of the husband and wife.

Reduced to its ultimate, the resulting issue of law thus raised here is whether the jury's verdict for the appellees as to both blocks of stock should have been followed, or whether the trial court was not only justified in disregarding it in so far as affected the 6000 shares, but should also have done so as to the 78 shares.

This court, upon a consideration of the extended record, briefs, and arguments, concludes that the solution of the question thus posed for it is found in the jury's answers to the five special issues submitted to it immediately before the two — 6 and 8 — quoted supra; those five, together with the answers thereto, were these:

"No. 1. Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the stock issued to Florence E. Seagraves by the Floboots Corporation was a gift from her daughter, Mrs. Davis?"

Answer: "Yes".

"No. 2. Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the stock issued to Florence E. Seagraves by the Greta Oil Corporation was received by her in exchange for stock held by her in the Floboots Corporation?"

Answer: "Yes".

"No. 3. Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the stock issued to Florence E. Seagraves by the Barnsdall Oil Company was received by her in exchange for stock held by her in the Greta Oil Corporation?"

Answer: "Yes".

"No. 4. Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the 6000 shares of preferred stock issued by the Western Gulf Petroleum Corporation to Florence E. Seagraves was received by her in exchange for stock held by her in the Barnsdall Oil Company?"

Answer: "Yes".

"No. 5. Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the 78 shares of common stock issued to Florence E. Seagraves by the Western Gulf Petroleum Corporation was paid for with the proceeds of the sale of stock issued to her by the Barnsdall Oil Company?"

Answer: "Yes".

No attack, as being unsupported by the evidence, has been made by either side against any of these findings, indeed, appellees sought judgment on them all and obtained it as to the 78 shares, although they now, on appeal, pronounce some of them, especially that under No. 4, to have been "merely evidentiary"; wherefore, in so far as material, they must all be accepted here as embodying the established facts.

So regarding them, it is further this court's view that neither inquiry No. 4, nor any of the others, may properly be regarded as only evidentiary, but, on the contrary, that they come clearly within the requirements of new rule No. 279, Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, as having submitted "the controlling issues made by the written pleadings and the evidence."

Furthermore, being of that character and going as they do progressively, step by step, to the very heart of the controversy, they each and all constituted such specific findings of determinative facts that no general finding like that under previously quoted issue No. 6 — to the effect that the property delivered to appellant Western Gulf for the issuance of its 6000 shares of preferred stock to Mrs....