Court Opinion

ID: 9829553
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 19:25:27.422623+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:02.862553
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
It is proper that brief reference be made to two contentions presented by appellee on motion for rehearing.
[12] The judgment rendered by this court is in favor of the Gladys City Company and the Guffey Petroleum Company. If it was error to render judgment for the Guffey Company, it is not one that operates to the prejudice of appellee, but only to the prejudice of its coplaintiff, the Gladys City Company. *182Whatever rights were not conferred upon the Guffey Company by the terms of the lease remain in the Gladys City Company; The judgment is in favor of both of them jointly, and it is not material to appellee how the matter is settled between them.
[13] Appellee further contends that the judgment is erroneous, in that it awards to appellants the value of the oil delivered to the Gulf Pipe Line Company instead of such value, less the cost of extraction. We quite readily agree with appellee that appellees in boring the well and extracting the oil acted under the belief, in good faith and upon reasonable grounds therefor, that they had a right to do so, and that the oil belonged to the Texas & New Orleans R. R. Company. In such case, under proper allegations and proof, it would have been proper to have deducted from the value of the oil in the tanks of the Gulf Pipe Line Company the reasonable value of extracting the same. Bender v. Brooks, 127 S. W. 170.
[14] But there are neither pleadings nor evidence presenting this issue. The plaintiffs sued for the value of this oil, alleged to be 80 cents per barrel. Neither by plea nor exceptions was this measure of damages controverted or put in issue. There are neither allegations nor proof as to the value of extracting the oil. The court found the quantity of oil and its value, to wit, 80 cents per barrel. No finding as to the cost of extraction was requested, nor, indeed, could such finding have been made upon the evidence. The court does find the cost of boring the well, but this alone was not sufficient either for the trial court or this court to determine the reasonable cost of extraction, so as to determine the measure of appellants’ recovery under.the rule contended for by appellees. No reference is made in the briefs of appellees, nor in the oral argument, to the question now here presented for the first time in the motion for a rehearing. In the circumstances we do not think that our judgment is erroneous in the matter complained of, as the case is presented by the record.
The motion for rehearing is overruled.
Overruled.