Opinion ID: 2165636
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: motions for partial summary judgment and district court's orders

Text: From August 2004 to April 2005, the parties filed a series of motions for partial summary judgment. This case was decided by two separate orders of the district court ruling on these motions without comment. The orders were filed on April 8 and 20, 2005. Central, EXCO, and Zecchi moved for partial summary judgment on Coral and KJJ's (1) fraud claims, (2) quiet title claim, (3) claims that Central had breached the JOA, (4) claim that Central had breached the amendment, and (5) claim that EXCO had tortiously interfered with Coral's contract rights. In addition, Zecchi and EXCO moved for partial summary judgment on their claim that the JOA did not cover EXCO's transfer of overriding royalty interests to Zecchi. The district court sustained all of these motions. Coral and KJJ moved for summary judgment on Central's counterclaim that Coral and KJJ had breached the JOA, which motion was sustained. Coral and KJJ also sought an order that five pages of the JOA, which included both the printed and type-written preferential right provisions, were unambiguous. This motion was also sustained; the court found the contract was unambiguous. Coral and KJJ also sought rulings on these specific issues: (1) that a sale of substantially all of a party's assets or stock to a non-affiliated third party in the exception to the preferential-right-to-purchase provision included only single entities, (2) that Central's sale to EXCO was not a sale of substantially all of Central's assets, and (3) that EXCO's transfer of overriding royalty interests to Zecchi was subject to the preferential-right-to-purchase provision. All of these motions were overruled. Finally, the court ordered Coral and KJJ to pay $6,000 in costs and fees in connection with its earlier discovery sanction for their failure to produce documents before a corporate deposition.