This case involved an attorney suing a mining corporation for $10,000 in compensation for legal and related services rendered continuously from 1921 to 1951, with the defendant countering that nearly all services had been paid for and that the four-year statute of limitations barred most of the claim. A jury returned a special verdict awarding $1,500 after valuing services in three separate periods and finding that an acknowledgment of the debt by the defendant's president tolled the limitations period for some earlier work. Both parties appealed, with the plaintiff challenging the adequacy of the award and certain jury instructions, and the defendant arguing that only $100 should have been recoverable. The Utah Supreme Court affirmed the judgment, concluding that the evidence supported the verdict and that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying a new trial.
This case involved a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the plaintiff against Ringsby Truck Lines and its driver after her husband and son were killed when their jeep struck a bridge on U.S. Highway 40, went out of control, and collided with the defendants' tractor-trailer. The trial court granted the defendants' motion to dismiss at the close of the plaintiff's evidence, finding insufficient proof that the truck driver was negligent in failing to avoid the collision or that any such negligence proximately caused the deaths. On appeal, the Utah Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal, reasoning that the evidence, viewed most favorably to the plaintiff, showed the driver observed the jeep hit the bridge but lost sight of it thereafter, with no brake marks or other indications he could have stopped or maneuvered in time to prevent the impact on his side of the road. The court concluded there was no basis for a jury to find the defendants liable under any theory.
The case concerned a shareholder who had possessed endorsed stock certificates since 1931 but was not listed as the record owner; she sued the corporation to recover dividends declared and paid between 1948 and 1950 to individuals appearing on the company's books as owners, including one who obtained reissued certificates by claiming the originals were lost and presenting an assignment from the widow of the deceased record holder. The trial court awarded her the dividends on 800 shares, and the Utah Supreme Court affirmed that judgment. The court reasoned that although statutes permit a corporation without notice to treat the record owner as entitled to dividends and to reissue certificates upon a lost-certificate claim backed by indemnity, those protections do not apply when the underlying assignment conveys no actual interest and the true owner never transferred her rights, rendering the payment a mistake that does not defeat her claim.
The case concerned a dispute over title to 112 shares of stock in the Mendon Central Irrigation Company, which the respondent claimed had passed as an appurtenance to farmland she acquired in 1949, while the appellant, as heir to the original owner Andrew Andersen, argued the water rights had been severed when Andersen conveyed them to the irrigation company in 1918. The Supreme Court of Utah affirmed the trial court's judgment quieting title to the stock in the respondent. Under statutes then in effect, a water right appurtenant to land passes with a conveyance of the land unless expressly reserved, and water rights represented by corporate stock are transferred by endorsement and delivery of the certificate. The court found that evidence of continuous irrigation use since 1890, the land's limited value without water, language in the probate decree and deeds referring to appurtenant water rights, and the appraisal of the land as including the water right sufficiently rebutted the statutory presumption that the rights did not pass with the land.
This case involved two brothers who inherited equal shares in remainder of their late father's house and lot in Utah, subject to a life estate held by their stepmother; after her death, one brother petitioned for partition by sale of the property and an accounting of rents allegedly taken by the other, while the second brother counterclaimed for specific performance of an alleged oral agreement to purchase his brother's interest for $900. The trial court denied the petition and granted specific performance, ordering conveyance of the interest upon payment of the $500 balance plus interest. On appeal, the Utah Supreme Court affirmed the outcome, holding that evidence established an oral contract for sale of land and that the buyer's payment of part of the price, taking possession, and making improvements constituted sufficient part performance to satisfy the statute of frauds under Utah law, thereby permitting enforcement despite the lack of a writing. The court remanded for entry of proper findings supporting the decree of specific performance.
The case involved Emerald Oil Co., a Utah corporation, seeking a refund of corporate franchise taxes paid for 1949 and 1950 on royalty income from oil leases on its Colorado land, arguing it was not doing business in Utah and that the income should not be allocated to the state. The State Tax Commission denied the refund, and the Utah Supreme Court affirmed that decision. The court held that the royalties were properly allocated to Utah under the franchise tax statutes because the corporation's primary business activities, including management of the leases, occurred in Utah; the income was not derived from business done outside the state; and unallocated income of a domestic corporation is presumed taxable in Utah. The opinion noted that the company's articles of incorporation and operations centered in Vernal, Utah, while its activities in Colorado were limited to passive lessor rights.