San Gabriel Valley Newspapers, Inc. v. Jenner

FORD, J. This is an appeal by San Gabriel Valley Newspapers, Inc., a California corporation, proprietor and publisher of The Covina Argus-Citizen, from a judgment modifying a prior judgment of July 31, 1952, with respect to the status of The Covina Argus-Citizen as a newspaper of general circulation.

[317]On July 31, 1952, by decree of the superior court, The Covina Argus-Citizen was adjudged to be a newspaper of general circulation “for the City of Covina, and for the County of Los Angeles, and for the State of California, ’ ’ as defined in section 6000 of the Government Code.1 On August 21, 1958, the respondent, A. J. Jenner, filed notice of a motion to have such adjudication vacated pursuant to the provisions of section 6024 of the Government Code.2 In the affidavit filed in support of the motion, respondent set forth that he is the publisher of the Covina Sentinel, a newspaper of general circulation, printed and published in the city of Covina, that since the time that The Covina Argus-Citizen was adjudicated to be a newspaper of general circulation, printed and published in the city of Covina, and for more than two years last past, The Covina Argus-Citizen has not been printed and published in the city of Covina but is printed and published in the city of West Covina, and that said newspaper has ceased to be a newspaper of general circulation, printed and published in the city of Covina. The affidavit of A. Q. Miller, Jr., was filed in opposition. In that affidavit he stated in part that The Covina Argus-Citizen has an office located in the city of Covina, “where news is collected and assembled, advertisements are solicited and accepted, and where the layout work of the newspaper is done and where substantial business affairs of said paper are conducted, ’ ’ that the newspaper has a building in West Covina, about one block from the city limits of Covina, at which building the mechanical work of printing the newspaper is done, and that the newspaper “has a substantial list of bona fide paying subscribers, ’' most of whom are in the city of Covina, and it has an audited circulation of 5,161, of which approximately 90 per cent is within [318]the city of Covina, and that the newspaper is under contract to the city of Covina to do its municipal official printing.