Title: Trusler v. GALAMBOS

State: indiana

Issuer: Indiana Supreme Court

Document:

238 Ind. 195 (1958)
149 N.E.2d 550
TRUSLER
v.
GALAMBOS ET AL.
No. 29,648.

Supreme Court of Indiana.
Filed April 18, 1958.
*197 Butt, Bowers & Anderson, of Evansville, for appellants.
Douglas H. McDonald and McDonald & McDonald, of Princeton, for appellee Louis P. Galambos.
*198 PER CURIAM.
Appellants have filed one transcript, containing one general bill of exceptions, and one assignment of errors. The appellee Louis P. Galambos has filed a motion to dismiss the appeal. For the purposes of deciding the motion to dismiss, we may adopt part of the appellants' statement of the record in the trial court, contained in appellants' original brief on the merits, as follows:
"The Appellee, Louis P. Galambos, filed two actions in the Court below. One was against Appellant, Claude L. Trusler, and Appellees, E. Paul du Pont, Jr., R. Jacques T. du Pont and Farm Bureau Oil Company, Inc., and was entitled Cause No. 58-168 in said Court. It was in two paragraphs, the first paragraph of which seeks the dissolution of an alleged partnership, syndicate or joint venture commonly known as the `Kentucky-Illinois syndicate' and an accounting. The second paragraph of said complaint seeks the dissolution of an alleged partnership, syndicate or joint venture commonly known as the `Kentucky Syndicate' and an accounting. Under both paragraphs, said Appellee, Louis P. Galambos, sought the appointment of a receiver pendente lite to take charge of the property and assets of said alleged partnerships, syndicates or joint ventures and to sell and dispose of the same and to wind up the partnership business....
"The second action filed by said Appellee, Louis P. Galambos, is one which shall be referred to, as a matter of convenience in this brief, as the `corporate' suit or cause, and was against Appellants Ardee Oil Co. and Claude L. Trusler, individually and as Director and Vice President of said company, and against Appellees E. Paul du Pont, Jr., individually and as Director and President of said company, R. Jacques T. du Pont and Farm Bureau Oil Company, Inc. It was assigned Cause *199 No. 58-169 by the trial court. It was brought by said Appellee as a stockholder in said Ardee Oil Co. to recover $150,000.00 as lost income or dividends allegedly due and owing to him by said corporation as a part of an alleged conspiracy against him by all of the other said parties except Farm Bureau. Said Galambos alleged the insolvency of said corporation and requested the appointment of a receiver pendente lite to take charge of the properties and assets of said company, to operate and manage the same and receive and preserve the property and income therefrom to the persons rightfully entitled thereto.
"In both of said actions, Appellee Farm Bureau Oil Company, Inc. was joined as a party defendant only as a stakeholder as the purchaser of the oil and/or gas produced from certain oil and gas leasehold estates or interests therein which allegedly were owned either by said syndicates or by said Ardee Oil Co."
In each cause the court appointed a receiver, and from these separate interlocutory orders this appeal is prosecuted.
The general bill of exceptions containing the evidence discloses that at the beginning of the hearing the following statements were made by counsel:
*200 The record fails to disclose that the court made an order consolidating the two causes as one cause, but the record does show the following entry:
There is no general statute in Indiana authorizing the consolidation of causes in trial courts, although § 43-706, Burns' 1952 Replacement, does authorize consolidation in actions to foreclose mechanics' liens. Central States Gas Co. v. Parker Russell Mining, etc. Co. (1925), 196 Ind. 163, 164, 142 N.E. 119. The rule is well settled in Indiana that trial courts do have the inherent power to consolidate causes in proper cases to expedite administration of justice. Trook v. Crouch (1923), 82 Ind. App. 309, 312, 137 N.E. 773; Oldfather v. Zent (1894), 11 Ind. App. 430, 432, 39 N.E. 221.
Rule 1-4A on consolidation, effective January 1, 1958, does not change the rules on consolidation approved in Russell v. Johnson (1943), 220 Ind. 649, 46 N.E.2d 219, hereafter noted.
The most recent and comprehensive statement of this court in the matter of consolidation is contained in Russell v. Johnson (1943), 220 Ind. 649, 658, 659, 46 N.E.2d 219, supra, wherein the following Massachusetts ruling was cited and approved:
If it be assumed that the two causes pending in the trial court could have been consolidated so that the causes of action were fused, as would be the case under the statutory consolidation of causes to foreclose mechanics' liens, it is to be noted that there was no order of court in the appeal at bar so consolidating the causes. What we find here is an illustration of the second class of consolidations noted by the Massachusetts court. If causes are to be consolidated so that the actions are fused into one, there should be an order of court so doing. 5 Lowe's Works' Indiana Practice, Form 4.11, p. 25; 1 Thompson's Indiana Forms (2d Ed.), Form 682, p. 491; Oldfather v. Zent (1894), 11 Ind. App. 430, 39 N.E. 221, supra.
We have not been cited to any case in this jurisdiction, nor do we know of any such case, where the court for convenience merely tried two causes at the same time under an agreement that the evidence might be considered in each, where it has been *203 held that the causes were merged or fused so that one finding and one judgment would be proper.
If the judgments are separate in separate causes, the rule is clear appeals cannot be prosecuted by one transcript and one assignment of errors. "The statute allows appeals from judgments in the circuit and common pleas courts, but it does not contemplate that several judgments shall be included in one transcript, and brought to this court in one appeal, simply because they are between the same parties, and relate to the same subject-matter. Nor does Section 558, 2 G. & H. 273, authorize the clerk to blend and join two separate and distinct judgments in one record, and authenticate them by one certificate. The transcript in each cause must have a separate certificate, to entitle it to recognition by this court on appeal, when objection is made. We are not willing to sanction the practice of appealing two causes in one record, and thus uniting them in one appeal." Rich v. Starbuck (1873), 45 Ind. 310, 312, 313. This case was followed in National Live Stock Ins. Co. v. Wolfe (1917), 63 Ind. App. 683, 115 N.E. 338, and Mercantile Commerce Bank & Tr. Co., Tr. v. Dept. of Fin. Insts. (1936), 103 Ind. App. 43, 46, 5 N.E.2d 141.[1] The record discloses that the trial court made no order consolidating one cause into another, nor did it consider that the causes were consolidated by fusing them into one action. A receiver was appointed in each *204 cause, and in each he filed a separate acceptance, oath and bond. Appellants filed separate praecipes and appeal bonds in each cause. An appeal by one transcript and one assignment of errors is not permitted any more than if the separate causes had been tried at separate times. The motion to dismiss should be sustained.
Appeal dismissed.
NOTE.  Reported in 149 N.E.2d 550.
[1]  In Roach v. Baker (1896), 145 Ind. 330, 333, 334, 43 N.E. 932, 44 N.E. 303, the consolidation record entry stated: "`By agreement of parties herein, the court now hears the evidence at the same time in both matters, that is in the petition for a writ of assistance on the part of said Clark, and also on the part of said Baker, against said Roach, and the evidence by one shall be considered in the action for the other.'"

The court held there was "no consolidation of the causes in the trial court."