Jul 26, 2017 6 min read

Perhaps, at the reading of a will some 90 years ago, the heirs were surprised to find the decedent, while still alive, wanted to make it known he was rankled by “polecat hunters” and their prey.

And we’re learning about those polecats today because they came up recently in a dispute about oil and gas rights that spans the years from Washington County’s first oil and gas boom all the way up to the present one.

The case, legally known as an “action to quiet title,” moved from the local courthouse this summer to state Superior Court on appeal.

A Google search comes up with this Philadelphia lawyer’s definition: “An action to quiet title is a lawsuit brought in a court having jurisdiction over land disputes in order to establish a party’s title to real property against anyone and everyone, and thus ‘quiet’ any challenges or claims to the title.”

Filing the action to quiet title in September 2014, over an approximately 100-acre tract in Donegal Township, western Washington County, were Patricia Carter, Carol Beth Wilson, John Allen Wilson and Elizabeth Wilson. They named as defendants Richard M. Fanning, Debra J. Fanning, Jeffrey Dutton, Lisa Dutton, Larry N. Cerciello and Kandy S. Cerciello, the current owners of the oil and gas rights.

The Fannings, Duttons and Cerciellos alleged that title to the land going back to 1825 does not indicate oil and gas rights were “severed” from the real estate. Judge Michael Lucas sustained their objections to the suit, and gave Carter and the Wilsons a chance to amend their complaint. In 2015, Carter and the Wilsons asserted that they owned 100 percent of the oil and natural gas under the Hanna tract because Hugh Hanna had orally made a gift of the oil and gas estate to his daughter, Berdie Wilson, of whom they are heirs, and that she had “asserted dominion and control over the oil and gas during Hugh Hanna’s lifetime.” Alternatively, Carter and the Wilsons alleged that Hugh Hanna had severed the surface of the farm and the coal from the oil and gas and that they are entitled to a half-interest in the oil and gas.

Lucas noted as part of a 68-page opinion that in 1889, John and Mary Gourley, then owners of what later became known as the Hanna tract, entered into a lease with W.E. Brooks and J.B. Duffy “for the sole and only purpose of drilling … for petroleum oil and gas.” Hugh Hanna purchased the tract in 1903, when the deed included no clause making exceptions for or reserving any mineral, coal, oil or natural gas rights. Hugh Hanna died Oct. 21, 1923, and the judge noted that Hanna’s will, “though colorfully written, contains no specific mention of any prior gift of the oil and gas rights to daughter Berdie Wilson.”

In the will, Hanna bequeathed to his wife, Elizabeth, and son, Howard T.E. Hanna, “the surface of the farm on which I reside … with all its outbuildings, including the mansion house, wash house, old brick house, barn, sheep shed, etc., which I value at $32,000, upon the following conditions, that they are to pay Francis Wilson the sum of $1,000 within one year of my death.”

The will continued, “And if they are not satisfied with this, they may apply to the pole cat hunters of McConnells Mills, who visited my farm in Chartiers Township from 125 to 150 times under the cover of darkness, committing all kinds of depredations, putting pole cats in my wells and giving me a dose of croton oil (a powerful purgative) and cutting my harness to pieces, and finally, but not least, burning my sheep shed and its contents, which I valued at $4,000.”

In a deposition, Carol Wilson contended this bequest was Hugh Hanna’s “way of saying” he had already gifted the oil and gas to Berdie Wilson, to whom Hanna also left shares of bank stock, government bonds and all the cash he had in Claysville National Bank at the time of his death – but with no specific mention of oil and gas interests.

Hanna’s widow contested the will because it contained no provision to pay creditors. In that case, Berdie Wilson received the share of her father’s estate having the greatest value – $8,606 – but no interest in real estate.

When Elizabeth Hanna died, her property passed to Howard T.E. Hanna, and Fanning, Dutton and Cerciello now own portions of that property. Carter and the Wilsons contend they have 100 percent ownership of the oil and gas estate because, during his lifetime, Hugh Hanna orally gave title to these assets to Berdie Wilson.

Lucas, however, decided Carter and the Wilsons did not meet their burden of proof through 1920s tax returns containing a reference to rent and royalty income that does not specify where the oil-producing income originated. Berdie Wilson and her husband, Alex, filed information about an oil lease, “managed by self,” but nothing more. Berdie Wilson recorded no documents reflecting the transfer of oil and gas rights to herself from Hugh Hanna.

Berdie Wilson, who died in 1976, according to a footnote in the Lucas opinion, was the paternal grandmother of plaintiffs Patricia Carter, John Allen Wilson and Carol Beth Wilson.

Carol Wilson stated her grandparents had oil and gas leases for multiple properties, but a photograph of a woman at a well that was introduced as evidence was too vague on which to base a claim, the judge noted in his legal opinion. Other evidence, the judge contended, was based on assumption, or, as the judge put it, “a speculative inference” based on “an Olympian leap of logic.”

Fred Gashel, who was born in 1933, lived across from the Hanna tract in his youth and knew Howard T.E. Hanna lived there. According to Gashel, Berdie Wilson lived “elsewhere” on Petroleum Avenue, but he knew nothing about the ownership of oil and gas under the Hanna tract and never saw Berdie Wilson on the property operating a well. But the judge dismissed as hearsay a story about Berdie Wilson halting an effort to construct a gas line from wells on the Hanna tract to the home of Logan Hilberry.

The judge noted that “after several weeks of reading, reviewing and considering the voluminous pleadings, discovery responses, deposition transcripts, aged documents and briefs, this court has been unable to identify a disputed material fact between the parties. The parties are not disputing what the facts are. Instead, they have hotly contested what the facts mean,” and, in an order, he granted the Fannings’, Duttons’ and Cerciellos’ request to dismiss the complaint by Carter and the Wilsons.

“The size of the record to review this matter is significant,” Lucas wrote in preparing a sort of nine-page index related to the appeal. “Merely stating that this court reincorporates its prior opinions would put the Superior Court to the task of finding the proverbial needle in the haystack.”

The Superior Court online docket shows that it received original records July 10 and set a briefing schedule with August deadlines. A hearing date had not been set.