Court Opinion

ID: 9833754
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 22:59:51.137943+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:44:06.443887
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
At a former day of this term this court reversed this case with instructions to sus*1056tain appellant’s plea of privilege, and transferred the case to Milam county. One of the appellees, the Phillip Carey Company, the plaintiff in the court below, and in whose favor judgment was rendered against appellant, has filed a motion for rehearing, and has presented the proposition that this court erred in holding that the trial court should have sustained the plea in abatement, because it appears from the record that' appellant presented and prosecuted a cross-action in the court below against both the plaintiff and appellant’s codefendants, Evens & Lee.
[2,3] As the case was originally submitted, appellant’s brief did not disclose the fact that a cross-action was presented; and while appellees’ brief, in giving a preliminary statement of the nature and result of the suit, stated that appellant claimed damages in excess of the amount sought to be recovered by appellee, still the filing of the cross-action was not urged as a waiver of the plea of privilege, and no authorities upon that subject were cited. In view of these facts, counsel for appellant, in reply to the motion for rehearing, invoke rule 40 (142 S. W. xiv), and insist that this court should not now consider the question of a waiver of the plea of privilege by filing the cross-action. The rule referred to, and another preceding it, require counsel for an appellant, in briefing a casé, to make a statement under each assignment and proposition of all the matters contained in the record pertinent to the assignment, and provide that, if the statement made in appellant’s brief is not controverted, the appellate court may accept it as correct, and decide the question without examining the record to verify the appellant’s statement. But that rule is not mandatory, and the appellate court may, at any time, while it has the case under consideration, look to the record in determining any question presented for decision. Furthermore, in this case, while the statement made by appellant under the assignment of error complaining of the action of the court in overruling the plea of privilege was not specifically controverted in appellee’s statement under its counterpropositions replying to that assignment, appellee’s preliminary statement of the case indicated that appellant had asserted a cross-action seeking to recover damages, and that preliminary statement was referred to as part of the statement made under appellee’s first counter proposition. Hence we have concluded that it is proper for this court to consider and decide whether or not by filing and prosecuting its cross-action appellant waived its plea of privilege; and that question seems to have been already settled in this state, the rule being that the filing of a cross-action seeking affirmative relief is equivalent to the institution of an independent suit, and constitutes a waiver of a plea asserting the right to be sued in another county. Douglas v. Baker, 79 Tex. 499, 15 S. W. 801: Slator v. Trostel, 21 S. W. 285; Grizzard v. Brown, 2 Tex. Civ. App. 584, 22 S. W. 252; Benchoff v. Stephenson, 72 S. W. 106; Kolp v. Shrader, 131 S. W. 860. Hence we have concluded that this court erred in the ruling heretofore made in this case. But, after due consideration of other questions presented, we have reached the conclusion that the case must be reversed and remanded for another trial in the court below for the following reasons;
[4] In its cross-action appellant alleged that appellees had breached their contract in reference to the construction of a certain building, and that, as a result of that breach, when it rained water leaked through, the roof and caused certain damages to the building and to the stock of merchandise which appellant had therein. The plaintiff presented exceptions to the plea referred to, and the ruling of the court was, in effect, that appellant might recover for injuries to the building, but not for injuries to the merchandise. In the latter ruling we think the court erred. If appellant was entitled to recover on account of defects in the roof, which resulted in water flowing through the same and into the building when it rained, we see no reason why injury to the merchandise located in the building was not as direct and proximate a result of the defect in the roof as was the injury to the walls caused by the leak. Of course, in making this ruling, we do not wish to be understood as holding that appellant was entitled to recover anything on its cross-action; that was, and still will be, a question of fact to be decided by the jury, and we express no opinion in reference thereto.
The point made in reference to the form of the verdict need not be decided, because upon another trial the court can require the jury to so frame their verdict as to render it certain that they have passed on all of the issues presented by the pleadings of the respective parties. In fact, if all parties should agree, no doubt it would simplify the case very much if it should be submitted upon special issues; because, after ascertaining the facts, the court could apply the law and render judgment accordingly.
[5] Before concluding this opinion, we deem, it proper to refer to a matter that has not been presented and discussed by either party. In the plaintiff’s amended petition upon which the case went to trial, a state of facts was recited which the petition alleged showed that either the Thorndale Mercantile Company or its codefendants, Evens & Lee, were liable to the plaintiff. In other words, the pleading referred to did not assert a distinct and unconditional liability against either defendant; and therefore, according to the decision of our Supreme Court in Oglesby’s Sureties v. State, 73 Tex. 658, 11 S. W. 873, it seems that it did not state a cause of action. As before stated, that question has not been presented in appellant’s brief; but, *1057as there are decisions which hold that a petition so defective as to be vulnerable to a general demurrer presents a question of fundamental error, we deem it proper to at least refer to that question, in order that the plaintiff may amend its petition and cure the defect referred to.
Eor the reasons stated, the motion for rehearing is sustained, and the judgment of the court below is reversed, and the cause remanded for another trial.
Keversed and remanded.