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.

Opinion:
GILLETTE MOTOR TRANSPORT, Inc. et al. v. NORTHERN OKLAHOMA BUTANE CO. et al.
No. 3937.
United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit.
Jan. 5, 1950.
Welcome D. Pierson, Oklahoma City, Okl. (Howard Hentz, Oklahoma City, Okl., on the brief) for appellants.
John D. Cheek, Oklahoma City, Okl., Alt. Singletary, Perry, Okl., and Duke Duvall, Oklahoma City, Okl., for appellees.
Before PHILLIPS, Chief Judge, and BRATTON and MURRAH, Circuit Judges.
MURRAH, Circuit Judge.
Two questions are presented by this appeal: First, whether the trial court erred in consolidating on its own motion, and over the objections of the defendants, a wrongful death action and a personal property action, where the question of liability is common to both; and, second, whether it erred in permitting the plaintiff to amend its complaint increasing the damages prayed for in the personal property action, after determination of liability.
Both actions arose out of a collision on an Oklahoma Highway between a motor freight truck operated by the appellant, Gillette Motor Transport Company and a butane or protane truck operated by the ap-pellee, Northern Oklahoma Butane Company. Archie Moore, the driver of the butane truck lost his life in the accident, and both of the trucks involved were damaged. Appellee, Archie H. Moore, individually and as administrator of the estate of his father, brought a wrongful death action, and appellee, Northern Oklahoma Butane Company brought a personal property action, each seeking damages allegedly sustained by the negligent operation of the Gillette truck. Gillette denied liability, and by counterclaim against the Butane Company sought personal property damages, allegedly sustained by the negligent operation of the butane truck. The appellant American Fidelity and Casualty Company is the insurance carrier of Gillette and ap-pellee Fidelity and Casualty Company is the insurance carrier of the Butane Company. The suits, originally filed in the State District Court, were removed to the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma on diversity of citizenship and requisite amount in controversy, both of which are present.
When the cases were at issue, the trial court upon its own motion and over the objections of the defendants, consolidated the two cases for trial. Upon agreement of the parties, the question of liability and the amount of damages to be awarded in the wrongful death action were submitted to the jury, the amount of damages to be awarded the Gillette Motor Transport Company or the Northern Oklahoma Butane Company was left for determination by the court, after the question of liability had been determined. The jury found that the accident was caused by the negligent operation of the Gillette truck, awarded damages of $2,000 in the wrongful death action, and the court awarded the Butane Company damages of $5,064.35 for the loss of its truck and cargo.
Appellants concede, as they must, the broad discretion vested in the trial court in ordering consolidation of cases for trial, where there is a “common question of law or fact”, Rule 42 (a), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, 28 U.S.C.A., but contend that the court abused its discretion in this instance because consolidation of the action for property damages with the wrongful death action involving “horrible and gruesome” details surrounding the death of the butane driver, unduly influenced the jury on the side of liability in the wrongful death action, which also spelled liability in the property action. The argument is that if the jury had been free to decide the- question of liability for the property damage without the necessity of also considering the liability for the wrongful death, its verdict would have been different.
At the same time appellants “admit that there was a conflict in the evidence over the question of liability” and “that the affirmance of the verdict of the jury in the Moore case in the sum of $2,000 is justified”. It is paradoxical to say in one breath that the verdict of the jury in the wrongful death action is justified under the evidence, and in the next breath say that a verdict for the property damages based upon the same evidence must fail because generated by prejudicial and inflammatory evidence. The argument falls by its own weight.
At the hearing to determine the amount of damages sustained by the Butane Company the evidence showed the value of the butane truck to exceed the amount alleged in the original complaint, and the court granted the Butane Company leave to amend as to the amount of damages sustained. Appellants were given an opportunity to present evidence as to value, but none was offered. Rule 15 (a), F.R.C.P. 28 U.S.C.A., provides that amendments should be freely allowed in the interest of justice. The complaint as amended did not change the cause of action—negligence remained the basis of the Butane Company’s action, and liability had been determined. The effect of the amendment was to allow the appellee to receive an amount which the evidence showed to be a fair and reasonable value of the property destroyed. Even before the advent of Rule 15 such amendments were allowed under the general statute, 28 U.S.C.A. § 777, of which Rule 15 is but a restatement. See Schulenberg v. Norton, 8 Cir., 49 F.2d 578; Concordia Ins. Co. of Milwaukee v. School Dist. No. 98, 10 Cir., 40 F.2d 379; Gregg v. Gier, Fed.Cas.No.5,799.
The judgment is affirmed.
. See Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Rules 1, 15, 61, 28 U.S.C.A.

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.

Choices:

Answer: 2