Court Opinion

ID: 9829874
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 19:41:43.157335+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:08.049624
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
In their motion for rehearing defendants insist that we misinterpreted • the stipulation between the parties set out in the original opinion and erred to their prejudice, in writing into the record that the effect of the stipulation was an admission by them that the allegations of plaintiff’s original petition, charging a breach of the dissolution agreement by hindering and preventing an audit, as provided therein, and allegations charging fraud in the manner in which the execution of the dissolution agreement was brought about, were true; that the opinion reflects unjustly upon them and may in the future be used to their prejudice, when the case is tried upon its merits; that the purpose of the stipulation was to obviate the necessity for introducing testimony in order to obtain a ruling on the question of law involved, that is, assuming that defendants did in fact owe plaintiffs money then due and payable under the terms of the contract, whether or not the contract itself, as pleaded by plaintiff, obligated defendants to pay plaintiff in Dallas county, or merely obligated them to enter into another contract to be performed in Dallas county.
We do not think we misinterpreted the stipulation; its meaning is so plain and terms so unambiguous that it could not well be misinterpreted, for it plainly states that it would not be necessary on the hearing of the contests of pleas of privilege for plaintiff to introduce any evidence, other than the contract for dissolution of the partnership, and plaintiff’s original petition. We understood that the purpose of the stipulation was to immediately bring the court to a decision of the question of law involved, as stated by appellants, and interpreted the stipulation to mean that, for purposes of the hearing of said contests, only, were plaintiff’s allegations to be considered as established; any other view of the matter would render the stipulation, as to the introduction in evidence of plaintiff’s original petition, altogether meaningless. We did not interpret the stipulation, however, as an admission by defendants that plaintiff’s allegations were in fact true, nor did we so find; these allegations were reproduced, in part, in the opinion, because under the terms of the stipulation they were properly before us for consideration and were, in our opinion, germane to the questions under discussion.
With this understanding, it can neither be correctly said nor implied that the opinion in any sense reflects upon defendants, nor would it be proper, on the trial of the case, to make use of the stipulation or the opinion, for any purpose, to the prejudice of defendants.
We have carefully considered all ground» urged for rehearing and, finding no error, the motion is overruled.
Overruled.