LAWRENCE v. CAREY

LAWRENCE v. CAREY
1922 OK 234
207 P. 969
87 Okla. 12
Case Number: 10781
Decided: 07/11/1922
Supreme Court of Oklahoma

LAWRENCE
v.
CAREY et al.

Syllabus

¶0 Appeal and Error -- Dismissal--Moot Questions.
Where an oil and gas lease by its terms expires while an action is pending for the cancellation thereof, and no practical relief can be gained by a decision, the case becomes moot, and will be regarded as abstract and hypothetical, and not necessary for decision, and will be dismissed. (Doctor's Oil Co. v. Adair et al., 83 Okla. 53, 200 P. 858.)

Error from District Court, Cotton County; Cham Jones, Judge.

Action by Nellie Carey against A. D. Lawrence and others to cancel a certain oil and gas lease. Judgment holding the oil and gas lease valid and decreeing certain defendants to be the owners thereof and directing that A. D. Lawrence execute an assignment of said lease to certain defendants. A. D. Lawrence appealed. On suggestion of the death of plaintiff in error, A. D. Lawrence, and that the questions involved in this appeal have become moot because the lease had expired by its terms, the appeal is dismissed.

S. I. McElhoes and Bridges & Vertrees, for plaintiff in error.
L. E. McKnight, Johnson & Stevens, and Parmenter & Parmenter, for defendants in error.

MILLER, J.

¶1 A. D. Lawrence, as plaintiff in error, prosecutes this appeal from a judgment of the district court of Cotton county, Okla., entered on the first day of February, 1919, decreeing that certain of the defendants in error were the owners of an interest in and to the oil and gas lease in controversy, and directing that the plaintiff in error execute to said defendants in error a good and sufficient assignment of said lease.

¶2 The attorney for plaintiff in error has, under date of June 3, 1922, filed in this court the following suggestion:

"The plaintiff in error, A. D. Lawrence, is now deceased and the lease involved in this suit is also dead, so that the questions involved herein are now moot. Under such circumstances the administrator of the estate of A. D. Lawrence has not felt it advisable to revive the case before its disposition, hence under the circumstances makes the suggestion to the court, leaving the disposition of the case to the court."

¶3 As the questions presented by this appeal have become moot, this appeal will be dismissed under the authority of the following cases: Doctors' Oil Co. v. Adair et al., 83 Okla. 53, 200 P. 858; Edmondson v. Wells, 87 Okla. 12. 207 P. 969; Oklahoma v. Taylor et al., 82 Okla. 220, 200 P. 149; Thomason, County Treasurer, v. Board of County Commissioners, 56 Okla. 79, 155 P. 881; Parrish v. School District No 19, 68 Okla. 42, 171 P. 461; Killough v. Ft. Supply Tel. Co., 55 Okla. 198, 154 P. 1192.

¶4 The appeal is hereby dismissed.