Castle Capital Corp. v. Arthur Young & Co.

1984 OK CIV APP 27, 686 P.2d 296, 81 Oil & Gas Rep. 558, 1984 Okla. Civ. App. LEXIS 115
CourtCourt of Civil Appeals of Oklahoma
DecidedMay 29, 1984
DocketNo. 58625
StatusPublished

This text of 1984 OK CIV APP 27 (Castle Capital Corp. v. Arthur Young & Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Civil Appeals of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Castle Capital Corp. v. Arthur Young & Co., 1984 OK CIV APP 27, 686 P.2d 296, 81 Oil & Gas Rep. 558, 1984 Okla. Civ. App. LEXIS 115 (Okla. Ct. App. 1984).

Opinion

MEANS, Presiding Judge.

Castle Capital appeals from the trial court’s sustainment of summary judgment for defendants Arthur Young and Company and James Houghton. Concerning these defendants, the trial court found no substantial controversy as to any material fact. Having reviewed the record and applicable law, we affirm.

Early in 1972 William Bradford, a Ponca City oilman and geologist who is now deceased, sought to form a series of partner[297]*297ships for oil and gas ventures. Bradford owned the controlling interests in both Pioneer Petroleum, Inc., and Frontier Corporation.

Bradford organized a drilling program which was designed to provide substantial federal income tax deductions by using a two-tier partnership structure. Investors would purchase interests in an initial partnership which would use that capital to explore and develop one of Pioneer’s oil and gas leaseholds. If the development proved successful, the partnership would sell to an outside lender, such as a bank, a carved out production payment (COPP).1 The proceeds from that COPP transaction would then be used to fund a second drilling partnership. Thus, a single investment would provide two sets of tax deductions for intangible drilling costs.

Under Bradford’s scheme the first partnership known as E-72 would be formed with Bradford as a sole general partner. Limited partnership units would be sold to investors and each cash investor would become a limited partner. In purchasing the limited partnership units, the limited partners would contribute all of the capital of E-72, or $800,000. Bradford as a general partner would have no interest in the profits, losses, or capital of E-72.

Using its $800,000 in capital investments, E-72 would purchase from Pioneer a 50 percent working interest in one of Pioneer’s oil and gas leaseholds. E-72 would contract with Pioneer for all work and equipment necessary to drill, develop and operate the leaseholds through December 31 of the contract year. In reality, Pioneer then contracted with Frontier for the actual operations.

The majority of the capital paid to Pioneer was allocated approximately as follows: 78 percent to intangible drilling costs; 10 percent to management fees; 1.24 percent to accounting, legal, and other expenses. These items were deductible on a pro rata basis for each limited partner provided that certain conditions were met. The rest of the capital was allocated for other nondeductible items. Potential investors were told that they would be able to realize a tax deduction as high as 180 percent of the amount invested.

When the leasehold had been developed enough to establish that it had economic value, Bradford would make further arrangements for other development of the leaseholds. This was accomplished by selling a carved out production payment to an outside lending source for approximately $800,000, payable out of 100 percent of the net revenues resulting from developing the leasehold in E-72. This sale of the COPP to an outside lending source, such as a bank, would be analogous to a non-recourse mortgage for tax purposes. The purchase price of the COPP, plus the agreed interest would be recovered by the outside lending institution only from the revenues generated by production from the working interest. Bradford told investors that a COPP loan would be available to E-72 from Fidelity Bank. Fidelity’s president, Grady Harris, made the same assurances.

Once the COPP loan was acquired, Bradford would form a second limited partnership, F-72, with Bradford as the general partner and the same limited partners as E-72. The limited partners of E-72 would receive a distribution of all the funds acquired from the COPP loan. These funds would immediately be invested in F-72. Thus, the capital of F-72 would be supplied éntirely from the funds acquired from the COPP loan obtained from an outside lending source. F-72 would then enter into an agreement with Pioneer to develop a second leasehold in the same manner as the [298]*298E-72/Pioneer agreement. Under a valid COPP loan scheme, the investors would realize substantial federal income tax benefits.

In March 1972, Bradford contacted James Houghton, a partner in Arthur Young and Company and an expert in oil and gas taxation, for an opinion concerning the type of partnership which he had planned. Houghton responded with an opinion letter based totally on a hypothetical situation. The letter stated in part:

ABC, Ltd. is a limited partnership formed to engage in the acquisition, exploration and development of oil and natural gas properties in which P is the general partner. The limited partners are investors who have subscribed to limited partnership interests in ABC. It is proposed to expend the partnership funds in the prescribed manner and immediately thereafter liquidate the partnership by distributing the developed oil and gas properties to the partners in proportion to their partnership interest. Thereafter it is proposed that one or more of the limited partners will carve-out for cash a production payment out of their fractional working interest to P or a related entity. You have stated that the price for the carved-out production payment will be determined in arms-length negotiations. It is proposed that one or more of the investors will use the proceeds of the carved-out production payment to subscribe to a new limited partnership to be formed by P although the terms of the carve-out do not require such subscription, nor do the terms of the subscription require such carve-out.
It is assumed that the carved-out production payment qualifies as such in all respects, most particularly that is payable solely from production and no other source and that payout is reasonably certain at the time of assignment.
Based solely upon the foregoing facts, we are of the opinion that the carved-out production payment is required to be treated as a mortgage loan for all income tax purposes ....

Houghton’s opinion letter, dated March 13,1972, distinguished Revenue Ruling 72-135,2 which was to be published later that same month. The letter did not contain any reservations or any cautions concerning this type of transaction.

Bradford then prepared a prospectus for the limited partnerships and sought investors for E-72. Bradford included Hough-ton’s opinion letter in the prospectus and used Arthur Young and Company as a reference.

In his search to raise capital, Bradford contacted Castle Capital Corporation in New York. Castle contacted Houghton who assured it that carved out production payment loans were not uncommon and that the two largest banks in Oklahoma City routinely engaged in that type of loan transaction. Houghton stated that such loans were “garden variety” types of transactions and that Fidelity Bank, as the third largest bank in Oklahoma City, probably also engaged in COPP transactions.

Castle presented the prospectus to several investors and obtained investments of $635,000 from the law firm of Lazarow, Rettig, and Sundel (LRS) and $44,000 from Frederick Schwartzman. Schwartzman entered into a contract with Bradford and Pioneer for a limited partnership in E-72 on October 25, 1972. Because of certain reservations which the investors had, on October 26, 1972, LRS executed a buy back agreement with Pioneer and Bradford. By the terms of the agreement, Pioneer and Bradford agreed to buy back the investors’ capital if a valid COPP loan was not obtained by December 1972.

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1984 OK CIV APP 27, 686 P.2d 296, 81 Oil & Gas Rep. 558, 1984 Okla. Civ. App. LEXIS 115, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/castle-capital-corp-v-arthur-young-co-oklacivapp-1984.