Burns v. Brown

173 P.2d 716, 76 Cal. App. 2d 639, 1946 Cal. App. LEXIS 759
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedOctober 29, 1946
DocketCiv. 7114
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 173 P.2d 716 (Burns v. Brown) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering California Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Burns v. Brown, 173 P.2d 716, 76 Cal. App. 2d 639, 1946 Cal. App. LEXIS 759 (Cal. Ct. App. 1946).

Opinion

*640 ADAMS, P. J.

This appeal is now before this court on a record consisting of a clerk’s transcript and what is entitled an Engrossed Statement on Appeal. The clerk’s transcript consists of the complaint and an amendment thereto, a demurrer which was overruled, the answer of defendants, findings of fact and conclusions of law, judgment, notice of appeal, and “notice by appellants pursuant to rules 6 and 7.” From the engrossed narrative statement the following appears. The trial was had on February 3, 1943, and testimony was given by the parties and other witnesses. Thereafter, on April 23, 1943, the court filed a “Memorandum of Decision” which is set forth in the statement. Defendants proposed findings and conclusions which are also set forth. Plaintiffs proposed “other and different findings contrary to the findings as proposed by defendants and contrary to the memorandum of decision,” but said proposed findings are not set forth. Thereafter, on or about August 15, 1943, appellants proposed additional findings which are set forth. At a hearing before the court subsequent to the trial it was orally stipulated by counsel for the parties that the property be surveyed under the direction of the court by a disinterested surveyor for the sole purpose of ascertaining the correct description of an overlap. It was also stipulated that, there being no disinterested surveyor in Del Norte County, Hal C. Acheson, a licensed surveyor from Humboldt County, be appointed to survey the overlap. In accordance with said stipulation the court made what is designated as “An Order, on Court’s own motion, appointing Surveyor to determine exterior boundaries of premises claimed by the parties hereto.” Said order is set forth. Thereafter, “pursuant to said oral stipulation and said order,” Acheson and the trial judge proceeded to the claims and “under the direction of the court, solely from evidence produced at the trial,” Acheson surveyed the overlap of the two claims on September 3, 1943. Acheson thereafter filed in the court a map showing the overlap, copy of same was furnished to counsel for both parties, and no objection to said map was made by either party. The court’s findings and judgment are included in the engrossed statement. It then recites that judgment was entered January 5th, notice was served on plaintiffs’ attorneys on January 10th, and on February 2d plaintiffs filed notice of intention to move for a new trial. Said motion was heard on February 28th, but no ruling made thereon for the reason that it was not filed in *641 time. The Order Settling Narrative Statement is dated September 19, 1944, and the engrossed statement, amended, was certified and approved November 6, 1944.

The substance of plaintiffs’ complaint filed in the action was that they located a mining claim in Del Norte County on September 19, 1939, known as the “High Plateau”; that while they were in possession of same, defendants, “by force of arms and great violence, ’ ’ ousted plaintiffs from said claim and have ever since withheld possession from plaintiffs. Defendants in their answer denied that plaintiffs had located the said claim, alleged that the premises in controversy had been located by them and had been in their lawful possession long prior to November, 1939, and that plaintiffs had trespassed thereon.

The trial court found that both plaintiffs and defendants had made Amlid locations, but that there was an overlapping of the íavo claims, and that defendant Eugene B. Brown was the prior locator of the OArerlapping portion. The judgment quieted the plaintiffs’ title to the location claimed by them except as to the overlap, and quieted defendants’ title to their claim including the overlap. A blueprint of the survey of the overlap made by Acheson is attached to and made a part of the judgment.

Plaintiffs on February 25, 1944, filed notice of appeal from the portions of the judgment in favor of defendants, and on March 6, 1944, filed a notice “Pursuant to rules 6 and 7,” stating therein that they desired in “lieu of a reporter’s transcript to pursue and perfect their appeal upon an agreed or settled statement as provided for in said Buies 6 and 7.”

On August 7, 1944, defendants filed in this court a motion to dismiss plaintiffs’ appeal on the ground that no notice to the clerk to prepare a transcript had been filed, and that no transcript was on file as required by rule 5 of the Buies on Appeal. In a written opposition to this motion to dismiss, appellants alleged that said motion was premature in that there was pending before the trial court the matter of settlement of a narrative statement on appeal “pursuant to Buie 7b of the Buies on Appeal.” Said written opposition was accompanied by an affidavit of counsel for appellants which averred that an order settling a narrative statement pursuant to rule 7 (b) had been made by the trial court, and that ap *642 pellants intended to cause said statement to be engrossed and to prosecute their appeal regularly.

In view of the foregoing allegations of appellants a dismissal of the appeal was denied without prejudice (Burns v. Brown, 66 Cal.App.2d 142 [151 P.2d 899]). On November 27, 1944, the engrossed statement was filed in this court. On December 4, 1944, appellants filed herein a petition to prove transcript under section 652 of the Code of Civil Procedure in which they averred that the statement settled by the trial court was not in accordance with the facts in that it did not include the judgment roll, the notice of appeal, the notice to the clerk of election to proceed by settled statement, the complaint, the answer, or any statement of the oral proceedings; and, particularly, that it excluded appellants’ proposed statement of oral proceedings reflecting additional evidence taken out of court in connection with the survey of the overlap, which appellants contended was irregular and prejudicial to their rights; and that all of said omitted matters were “necessary and proper parts of the record on appeal, necessary and material to a determination of the appeal on the merits, and necessary and material to the presentation and substantiation of the points relied upon by appellants on appeal, and specified in their proposed statement of the case.” This petition was denied by this court without opinion, whereupon appellants petitioned for a hearing in the Supreme Court, asserting in their petition therefor that “appellants’ points on appeal cannot be adequately presented in the absence of a proper record in accordance with the facts. ’ ’

The Supreme Court granted a hearing, and on February 8, 1946, rendered a decision which relieved appellants from default in failing to include in their notice of appeal a request for a clerk’s transcript, and directed the trial court to include in the record on appeal the judgment roll, notice of appeal, and notice of election to proceed under rule 7 (Burns v. Brown, 27 Cal.2d 631 [166 P.2d 1]).

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Bluebook (online)
173 P.2d 716, 76 Cal. App. 2d 639, 1946 Cal. App. LEXIS 759, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/burns-v-brown-calctapp-1946.