Task: songer_appbus

What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
Intervenors who participated as parties at the courts of appeals should be counted as either appellants or respondents when it can be determined whose position they supported. For example, if there were two plaintiffs who lost in district court, appealed, and were joined by four intervenors who also asked the court of appeals to reverse the district court, the number of appellants should be coded as six.
In some cases there is some confusion over who should be listed as the appellant and who as the respondent. This confusion is primarily the result of the presence of multiple docket numbers consolidated into a single appeal that is disposed of by a single opinion. Most frequently, this occurs when there are cross appeals and/or when one litigant sued (or was sued by) multiple litigants that were originally filed in district court as separate actions. The coding rule followed in such cases should be to go strictly by the designation provided in the title of the case. The first person listed in the title as the appellant should be coded as the appellant even if they subsequently appeared in a second docket number as the respondent and regardless of who was characterized as the appellant in the opinion.
To clarify the coding conventions, consider the following hypothetical case in which the US Justice Department sues a labor union to strike down a racially discriminatory seniority system and the corporation (siding with the position of its union) simultaneously sues the government to get an injunction to block enforcement of the relevant civil rights law. From a district court decision that consolidated the two suits and declared the seniority system illegal but refused to impose financial penalties on the union, the corporation appeals and the government and union file cross appeals from the decision in the suit brought by the government. Assume the case was listed in the Federal Reporter as follows:
United States of America,
Plaintiff, Appellant
v
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendant, Appellee.
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendants, Cross-appellants
v
United States of America.
Widgets, Inc. & Susan Kuersten Sheehan, President & Chairman
of the Board
Plaintiff, Appellants,
v
United States of America,
Defendant, Appellee.
This case should be coded as follows:Appellant = United States, Respondents = International Brotherhood of Widget Workers Widgets, Inc., Total number of appellants = 1, Number of appellants that fall into the category "the federal government, its agencies, and officials" = 1, Total number of respondents = 3, Number of respondents that fall into the category "private business and its executives" = 2, Number of respondents that fall into the category "groups and associations" = 1.
Note that if an individual is listed by name, but their appearance in the case is as a government official, then they should be counted as a government rather than as a private person. For example, in the case "Billy Jones & Alfredo Ruiz v Joe Smith" where Smith is a state prisoner who brought a civil rights suit against two of the wardens in the prison (Jones & Ruiz), the following values should be coded: number of appellants that fall into the category "natural persons" =0 and number that fall into the category "state governments, their agencies, and officials" =2. A similar logic should be applied to businesses and associations. Officers of a company or association whose role in the case is as a representative of their company or association should be coded as being a business or association rather than as a natural person. However, employees of a business or a government who are suing their employer should be coded as natural persons. Likewise, employees who are charged with criminal conduct for action that was contrary to the company policies should be considered natural persons.
If the title of a case listed a corporation by name and then listed the names of two individuals that the opinion indicated were top officers of the same corporation as the appellants, then the number of appellants should be coded as three and all three were coded as a business (with the identical detailed code). Similar logic should be applied when government officials or officers of an association were listed by name.
Your specific task is to determine the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "private business and its executives". If the total number cannot be determined (e.g., if the appellant is listed as "Smith, et. al." and the opinion does not specify who is included in the "et.al."), then answer 99.

PER CURIAM.
The purported appeal in this case is a backwash of Benitez v. Anciani, 1 Cir., 1942, 127 F.2d 121. After our mandate in this case went down, the District Court on March 9, 1943, upon motion of J. Octavio Seix, entered an order dismissing the bankruptcy proceedings. Carlota Benitez de Seix, J. Octavio Seix, and Jaime Seix Irahola filed a notice of appeal from said order, which had granted what appellant J. Octavio Seix asked for. On December 17, 1943, this court entered an order dismissing the appeals of J. Octavio Seix and Carlota Benitez de Seix for lack of diligent prosecution. On January 10, 1944, the appeal of Jaime Seix Irahola having meanwhile been continued under 50 U.S.C.A.Appendix, § 521 until further order of this court, the same was dismissed upon application of J. Octavio Seix as attorney in fact for Irahola.
After our mandate on this second appeal went down, the appellee moved in the District Court for taxation of costs in connection with the appeal, in the sum of $158.-35. This application came on for hearing before the District Court on March 10, 1944. J. Octavio Seix moved for a temporary stay of the proceedings under 50 U.S.C.A.Appendix, § 521 on the ground that Jaime Seix Irahola was absent in the military service. By order entered March 15, 1944, the District Court denied such application for stay of proceedings, reciting that the only matter pending in the proceedings was the taxation of costs and that since Irahola “appears to be adequately represented by his attorney-in-fact there is no reason to delay further the proceedings necessary to a final termination of this litigation.” On April 15, 1944, the court entered an order taxing costs against appellants in the sum of $158.35 and ordered that execution therefor issue in the manner provided by law.
Meanwhile on April 12, 1944, appellants filed in the District Court a notice of appeal from the said order of March 15, 1944, denying the application for stay of proceedings. This is the appeal now pending.
■ Appellants have also submitted to this court an application for stay of the proceedings on appeal, pursuant to the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Civil Relief Act of 1940, 50 U.S.C.A.Appendix, § 521. Appellee has filed an opposition to this application and has moved for “the dismissal of this frivolous and groundless appeal.”
Since less than $500 is involved, an appeal cannot be taken as a matter of right, but only upon allowance of the appellate court. 11 U.S.C.A. § 47. No petition for allowance of the appeal has been filed with the clerk of this court as prescribed by our Rule 11. In view of Reconstruction Finance Corporation v. Prudence Securities Advisory Group, 1941, 311 U.S. 579, 61 S.Ct. 331, 85 L.Ed. 364, this would seem to be a procedural irregularity rather than a jurisdictional defect, and we have power to allow the appeal, treating the notice of appeal filed in the court below as an informal substitute for the application to us. But as the Supreme Court ■said in the case just cited (at page 582 of 311 U.S., at page 333 of 61 S.Ct., 85 L. Ed. 364): “Normally the Circuit Court ■of Appeals would be wholly justified in treating the mere filing of a notice of appeal in the District Court as insufficient.” Assuming that it is within our discretion to allow the appeal, we decline to allow it. There is in this case no such' special equity as was present in Reconstruction Finance Corporation v. Prudence Securities Advisory Group, supra, as would warrant us in disregarding the procedural irregularity in the interests of substantial justice.
Furthermore, as appears from appellee’s opposition to the application for stay of proceedings, even if the appeal had been properly perfected, it has become moot. On May 6, 1944, upon the basis of a motion by appellee waiving its claim to costs, the District Court entered an order vacating and setting aside its order of April 15, 1944, taxing costs against the present appellants. The District Court’s order of March 9, 1943, dismissing the bankruptcy proceedings stands beyond challenge, appellants’ appeal therefrom having been dismissed; there is now no question of taxing costs against appellants on account of that appeal; such proceedings are therefore at an end. There is now no point, merely because of Irahola’s absence in the military service, in keeping in suspense the present attempted appeal from the order of March 15, 1944.
The application of appellants for stay of proceedings is denied; the notice of appeal filed in the court below treated as an irregular application to us for leave to appeal is denied; the motion to dismiss filed by appellee is granted, and the appeal is dismissed.

Question: What is the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "private business and its executives"? Answer with a number.
Answer:

Answer: 3