Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. v. Harris Co.

Tom Glaze, Justice.

This appeal was certified to the supreme court by the court of appeals pursuant to Ark. Sup. Ct. R. l-2(g), which provides that cases may be transferred between the courts in order to achieve a fair allocation of the appellate workload.

On April 9, 2001, the Harris Company was working to widen and lower a road when, in the course of excavating part of the road bed, one of its machines damaged a buried phone line belonging to Southwestern Bell. The phone fine consisted of a copper cable, used for transmitting telephone lines and data, and a fiber optic cable. Prior to…