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:
FIDELITY STORAGE CO. et al. v. JAQUES.
No. 6263.
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
Argued Jan. 8, 1935.
Decided Feb. 11, 1935.
C. H. Merillat, of Washington, D. C., for appellants.
W. W. Millan, of Washington, D. C, for appellee.
Before MARTIN, Chief Justice, and ROBB, VAN ORSDEL, and HITZ, Associate Justices.
VAN ORSDEL, Associate Justice.
This case was here on a former appeal, Fidelity Storage Company et al. v. Jaques, 61 App. D. C. 337, 62 F.(2d) 876, where a decree based on a finding of fact was entered.
Briefly, the Fidelity Storage Company, through David B. Karrick and Harry S. Plager, persons connected and, associated with the storage company, loaned to appel-lee, plaintiff below, $600, for which plaintiff gave two notes, one for $100 and one for $500. These notes were collaterally secured by certain household goods stored by plaintiff with the storage company. The court in that case found that ten days after the maturity of the notes, without notice to the plaintiff, or public notice of any kind, the goods were sold and purchased by Plager for an amount barely sufficient to satisfy the notes. The court found that the sale was null and void; and that, in the event the property was no longer in the possession of the defendants and capable of being returned to plaintiff, plaintiff recover from defendants the fair market value of the goods; and that defendants be credited with the amount of the loan of $600, together with interest thereon, and storage charges from October 28 to November 5,1925. The court then referred the case to the auditor to fix the value of the goods and the amount of the liabilities, if any, of the defendants and each of them in accordance with the decree. From that order an appeal was taken, which was here dismissed on the ground that it was not a final order from which appeal could be taken.
The case went back tb the court below, and the auditor made his finding, under the order of reference, fixing the value of the goods at $2j000, and finding a balance due the plaintiff of $1,395.33. For this amount judgment was entered, and from the judgment this appeal was taken.
We find it unnecessary to review the voluminous record, since, from a careful examination thereof, we are satisfied that the court below reached a proper conclusion in finding, from the evidence, that the sale was void. On the facts established, the law of the case is ruled by Ohio National Bank v. Central Const. Co., 17 App. D. C. 524.
In Richardson v. Van Auken, 5 App. D. C. 209, 213, the court, considering the binding effect upon the appellate court of the findings of a master or auditor, when concurred in by the court below, said: “This rule requiring exceptions to be specific and definite in pointing out the supposed errors in the report, has a close logical relation to another rule of practice equally well established, and that is, that the findings of a master or an auditor, concurred in by the court below, .are to be taken as presumptively correct, and will be permitted to stand, unless some obvious error has intervened in the application of the law, or the principles of the decree under which he acts, or some important mistake has been made in the evidence, and which has been clearly pointed out and made manifest. This rule has been repeatedly affirmed by the Supreme Court of the United States, and is one of general application in the equity practice, both in the Federal and State courts of the country. Tilghman v. Proctor, 125 U. S. 136 [8 S. Ct. 894, 31 L. Ed. 664]; Evans v. State Nat. Bank, 141 U. S. 107 [11 S. Ct. 885, 35 L. Ed. 654]; Crawford v. Neal, 144 U. S. 585 [12 S. Ct. 759, 36 L. Ed. 552]; Furrer v. Ferris, 145 U. S. 132 [2 S. Ct. 821, 36 L. Ed. 649].”
Applying this rule to the instant case, we find no mistake in the evidence or error of law which would justify a reversal of the decree.
The decree is affirmed, with costs.

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: 3