Griffin v. HL Peterson Company

427 S.W.2d 140, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2226
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedApril 5, 1968
Docket17014
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 427 S.W.2d 140 (Griffin v. HL Peterson Company) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Griffin v. HL Peterson Company, 427 S.W.2d 140, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2226 (Tex. Ct. App. 1968).

Opinion

DIXON, Chief Justice.

Our former opinion in this case is withdrawn and the following is substituted.

This is an appeal from a summary judgment.

On January 21, 1966 appellants Margaret Griffin and her two sons, Clark D. Bryant and L. R. Bryant, sued appellees H. L. Peterson Company and J. Dowell Hunt, Jr., seeking cancellation of two contracts. Hunt was a salesman for H. L. Peterson Company.

The first contract, dated July 2, 1965, is a sales agreement for the purchase by appellants from H. L. Peterson Company of a silo called a “Harvestore”, with named appurtenances, the consideration being $25,915.

The second contract is a lease agreement covering the same property, dated the same day, July 2, 1965, with H. L. Peterson Company as lessor and appellants as lessees for a term of 96 months, the consideration being $36,280.32 payable $377.92 per month.

In their petition appellants allege that the second contract, the lease contract, was executed and delivered in blank and was filled out subsequent to appellants’ signing thereof. Appellants further allege that after discovering (on receipt of the filled out lease agreement) that the total consideration was to be $36,280.32 instead of the $25,915 shown in the sales contract they stopped payment on their remittances. They plead that they then informed appel-lees they did not desire to purchase the silo, requested appellees to remove portions of the equipment and the silo theretofore delivered and offered to restore to appel-lees all consideration, if any, received by appellants.

Appellees in an affidavit say that they told appellants they could elect either to purchase the silo or lease it, but that if they chose to lease it over a long term the consideration would be substantially greater than if they purchased it.

Soon after the filing of appellants’ suit General Electric Credit Corporation filed its petition in intervention, alleging that it was the assignee of a lease contract between appellants and H. L. Peterson Company dated October 4, 1965. This agreement, the third contract signed by appellants, was substantially like the earlier lease agreement. It too covered a term of 96 months for a consideration of $36,280.32 payable in monthly installments of $377.92 beginning November 1, 1965. The property description is the same as that in the other lease contract. This contract was assigned to the intervenor on October 5, 1965, the next day after its execution.

Intervenor alleged that appellants .made the payments due November 1, 1965 and December 1, 1965, but defaulted in payments thereafter. Intervenor then declared the full amount due and sued for debt and foreclosure.

Intervenor also alleged that if appellants executed and delivered a lease contract in blank on July 2, 1965 that lease contract was subsequently rescinded, cancelled and destroyed with the mutual consent and agreement of appellants and appellees prior to the execution and delivery of the lease agreement of October 4, 1965, on which in-tervenor is suing.

Appellants do not mention the third contract anywhere in their pleadings — either in their Original Petition, filed January 21, 1966, or in a Supplemental Petition, filed November 9, 1966. Yet it is evident and undenied as shown by the affidavits/including an affidavit by Mrs. Griffin, that appellants did sign the third contract, the lease agreement dated October 4, 1965. And it is also evident and undenied that it *143 was intended by the parties that said lease contract of October 4, 1965 should supersede, and in truth did supersede, the two earlier contracts of July 2,1965.

Appellees and intervenor filed motions for summary judgments. Appellants filed no answers to the motions for summary judgment.

However, after the filing of the motions, but before the motions had been acted on, appellants filed a Supplemental Petition. In this pleading they prayed for judgment against appellees by way of offset of $36,-280.32 against any judgment recovered by appellees against them. As grounds appellants in general terms alleged fraudulent representations and, for the first time, breach of warranty. Appellees filed an answer to the Supplemental Petition, the answer consisting of special exceptions and a general denial.

The motion for summary judgment of the intervenor General Electric Credit Corporation was sustained and an interlocutory judgment rendered in favor of interven- or for $35,146.46 plus interest at the rate of 10% per annum from March 1, 1966. The motion of H. L. Peterson Company and its salesman, Hunt, was overruled. The reason given by the court for overruling the latter motion was that the affidavits supporting the motion did not cover the allegations in appellants’ supplemental pleading as to breach of warranty.

H. L. Peterson Company and Hunt then filed a second motion for summary judgment and in their supporting affidavits they sought to negative appellants’ pleading of fraudulent misrepresentations and breach of warranty.

Appellants filed an answer to the second motion for summary judgment, which answer is supported by an affidavit executed by Mrs. Griffin.

The court sustained appellees’ second motion. Judgment was then rendered making final the interlocutory judgment in favor of General Electric Credit Corporation and decreeing that appellants take nothing in their suit against H. L. Peterson Company and J. Dowell Hunt, Jr.

Appellants are making only a limited appeal. Rule 353(c), Vernon’s Texas Rules of Civil Procedure. They are not appealing from the summary judgment in favor of the intervenor, General Electric Credit Corporation. They attack only the judgment in favor of H. L. Peterson Company and Hunt.

OPINION

We agree with appellees’ contention that since the judgment in favor of General Electric Credit Corporation, the holder of the contract here involved, has been allowed to become final, appellants’ original suit for cancellation has been abandoned. Only appellants’ Supplemental Petition asking for the first time for judgment against appellees by way of offset, is before us for consideration. Since appel-lees in their answer do not seek a money judgment against appellants it is difficult to see how a money judgment by way of offset can be rendered in favor of appellants.

The substance of appellants’ one point on appeal is that there are fact questions raised by the evidence as to (1) false representations, and (2) breach of warranty; and further they claim that even if their pleadings be insufficient in their present state to support a judgment in their favor, it was error to grant the summary judgment since they could cure such insuffi-ciencies by amending their pleadings to allege fraud, accident or mistake.

In her affidavit Mrs. Griffin says that Hunt, the salesman, represented to her that the installation of the silo “would make my dairy operation more successful and more profitable”; that the savings resulting from the use of the silo would pay for it over the time covered by the contract; that “the feeding of silage to dairy cattle would lead to greater milk production”; and other like representations.

*144 The above representations do not constitute fraud or misrepresentation.

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Bluebook (online)
427 S.W.2d 140, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2226, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/griffin-v-hl-peterson-company-texapp-1968.