DocketNumber: No. 9264.
Citation Numbers: 161 S.W.2d 856
Judges: BAUGH, Justice.
Filed Date: 4/22/1942
Status: Precedential
Modified Date: 1/12/2023
This is a Rule 37 case. It is the third time this same well and same tract of land has been before this court for review. Originally we held that the well was not authorized as an exception to the rule either to prevent confiscation or to prevent waste. While the motion for rehearing on the first appeal was pending, the Supreme Court announced its decision in Gulf Land Company v. Atlantic Refining Company,
Upon a retrial of said case after a remand thereof the trial court again sustained the permit. On the second appeal we expressly held the permit void, and the issue of confiscation was finally adjudicated, absent changed conditions. There-after the Commission again granted said permit (the well having already been drilled, it was but a permit to operate it) on the recited grounds to prevent confiscation and to prevent waste. The ground on which it was applied for was as an offset to well No. 4 on the Reynolds adjoining tract on the east, which well was then under attack in a pending suit, and was there-after finally set aside by the District Court. See Reynolds v. Ward Oil Corporation, Tex. Civ. App.
On the issue of waste applicant's own witness testified before the examiner for the Commission that, though in his opinion the "more wells more oil" theory was correct, no waste under the then existing conditions was occurring on this tract without the well here involved. In this general area, near the town of London, excessive drilling had occurred, and had already caused premature encroachment of water, and "channeling and by-passing." See
In view of the numerous cases involving this issue, not necessary to cite here, and the fact findings of the Commission on which Rule 37 is based, it would, we think, be a reductio ad absurdum to hold, under the uncontroverted facts shown, that it is necessary to drill two wells on 1/15 of an acre of land in order to prevent waste.
The error of the trial court, conceding it to be error, in confining the evidence upon the trial to the matters presented to the Commission, is harmless, where as here, such evidence before the Commission and the documentary evidence presented to the trial court taken in connection with matters finally adjudicated on former appeals involving the same subject matter, show as a matter of law that the permit is invalid. And clearly we think it so shows. The judgment of the trial court is therefore affirmed.
Affirmed.