Embarrassingly, the always excellent Florida Arbitration Law blog has scooped us on a Texas state appellate court decision on arbitrability. Instead of recapping their summary of the Beaumont opinion on whether or not participation in litigation discovery waives a potential right to compel arbitration, we’ll just give you a link and direct you to their commentary. The Beaumont Court, by the way, in part bases its decision on the Texas Supre

Continue reading...

The Texas Supreme Court has in the past year or two emphasized that non-signatories to arbitration agreements can still be required to arbitrate certain disputes. (see prior blog posts here, here, and here). This morning, the Court analyzed circumstances in which a non-signatory can actually compel arbitration pursuant to a contract to which the non-signatory was, of course, not a party. The majority opinion, written by Justice Hecht, continues t

Continue reading...

This morning, the Texas Supreme Court issued a per curiam opinion in a case which concludes that a guardian ad litem’s fee was unreasonable and remands to the trial court the issue of the reasonableness of the fee. The case discusses the applicable standard for evaluating an ad litem’s fee and is an important one for anyone who litigates cases in which settlements are made on behalf of minor children. The underlying case stemmed from

Continue reading...

The Third Court of Appeals issued an opinion on interlocutory appeal this morning affirming a trial court’s denial of a plea to the jurisdiction filed by the Austin Independent School District. The opinion clearly states that an AISD employee’s claim against the district for violation of the Texas Commission on Human Rights Act (the “Act”) is NOT a claim that the employee has been aggrieved by the school laws of the state,

Continue reading...

According to the Texas Secretary of State, our good friend, colleague, office-mate and frequent co-counsel Diane Henson has won her election to the Third Court of Appeals. We look forward to blogging about her opinions, which will invariably be well-written, thorough and absolutely devoid of typos. While we selfishly hate to lose her, we can say without question that her election is good for Texas. Also, if the judicial results reported by the Au

Continue reading...

This morning, the Third Court of Appeals, sitting en banc on a Motion for Rehearing, issued an opinion holding that certain language in the Texas tax code which uses the word “may” is in fact mandatory, such that a successful Texas property tax protestant has an entitlement to his, her or its attorneys’ fees in making the protest. The opinion, which replaces an older opinion blogged about quite briefly here, addresses a split am

Continue reading...

The Third Court of Appeals issued an interesting memorandum opinion this morning affirming a trial court’s default judgment in a case where a registered agent refused to accept service of process in a premises case. In the underlying case, the plaintiff hired two separate process servers who tried unsuccessfully to serve a restaurant’s registered agent, both personally and via certified mail (the certified mailings were returned marke

Continue reading...

The Third Court of Appeals has released an opinion on an interlocutory appeal which clearly sets forth the rule that in enacting the Whistleblower Act the Texas Legislature waived immunity from both suit and liability, and that a governmental entity is not entitled as a matter of right to an evidentiary hearing on a plea to the jurisdiction on sovereign immunity grounds. First, some quick background. The Texas Supreme Court has held that sovereig

Continue reading...

We don’t do family law, at least as advocates, so this blog typically does not address opinions in family law cases, but this morning the Third Court of Appeals handed down an opinion that seems worth mentioning, as the Court took the time to mention the deference that is to be given to mediated settlement agreements, and unusual dispute resolution mechanisms that may be embodied therein. The case stems from a 1998 mediated divorce. The dec

Continue reading...

This morning, the Texas Supreme Court reversed trial court and Tenth Court of Appeals findings that Kroger was liable for injuries one of its employees sustained while helping a customer load grocery bags into her car. The employee in question had placed one hand on the customer’s car door jamb while steadying the cart with his foot when the customer slammed her car door on his hand (the parking lot was on a slope, hence the foot-steadying)

Continue reading...