John Cornyn

The case involved Perry Equipment Corporation (PECO) suing accounting firm Arthur Andersen for a faulty audit of Maloney Pipeline Systems, which PECO relied on when purchasing the company that later went bankrupt; PECO brought claims under the Deceptive Trade Practices Act (DTPA), fraud, negligence, and breach of warranty. The trial court entered judgment for PECO based on the jury verdict, which the court of appeals affirmed. The Texas Supreme Court held that PECO qualified as a DTPA consumer because it was the beneficiary of the audit services procured as a condition of the sale, even though it did not pay for them directly. The court reversed and remanded, however, because the jury charge failed to instruct on the proper measure of damages and because the award of attorney's fees was improperly based on a percentage of recovery rather than a specific dollar amount supported by evidence of reasonableness and necessity under the DTPA.

business & regulatorytorts & liability

This case involved a homeowner who sued her insurance company for breach of contract and bad faith after the insurer denied a claim for foundation damage caused by a water leak. The insurer moved to sever the contract claim from the bad faith claim and abate the latter until the former was resolved, arguing that certain evidence would prejudice its defense on the contract issue. The trial court denied the motions, and the Texas Supreme Court considered whether this was an abuse of discretion in a mandamus proceeding. The Court held that the trial court acted within its discretion, reasoning that the claims are independent but bad faith typically requires a showing of contract breach, severance is not required in every instance, and the rules give trial courts broad discretion over severance without a clear showing of undue prejudice such as from settlement offers.

proceduretorts & liability

This case involved a proposed class action settlement in Texas state court on behalf of approximately 645,000 owners of certain 1978-1991 GMC and Chevrolet pickup trucks, who alleged that the trucks' side-mounted gas tanks reduced the vehicles' market value due to heightened fire risk in side-impact collisions; the plaintiffs sought only economic damages and expressly disclaimed personal injury claims. The trial court certified the class for settlement purposes only and approved an agreement under which class members could receive $1,000 certificates (or $500 nontransferable certificates) redeemable toward the purchase of new GM vehicles, in exchange for releasing claims against GM related to the fuel system design. The court of appeals reversed, holding that the trial court abused its discretion, and the Texas Supreme Court affirmed that ruling, concluding that the record lacked sufficient findings on the fairness, adequacy, and reasonableness of the settlement and that the class notice was deficient for failing to disclose the amount of requested attorney's fees. The court reasoned that Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 42(e) requires careful judicial scrutiny of class settlements to protect absent class members, particularly where class counsel's interests may conflict with those of the class, and remanded for further proceedings including evidence on the necessity and reasonableness of the fees.

proceduretorts & liabilitybusiness & regulatory

In Ford Motor Co. v. Leggat, Ford sought mandamus relief from a trial court order compelling production of documents and information in a products liability suit stemming from a fatal Bronco II rollover on Interstate 45. The disputed items included a 1982 in-house counsel report to Ford's Policy and Strategy Committee, technical data prepared by engineers at the request of outside counsel, and settlement amounts paid in other Bronco II rollover cases. The Texas Supreme Court conditionally granted the writ, concluding the trial court abused its discretion because the materials were protected by attorney-client privilege or the work-product doctrine, the settlement figures were irrelevant to the claims, and Ford lacked an adequate appellate remedy.

proceduretorts & liability

The case involved homeowners who sued a real estate developer for property damage from repeated flooding, which they attributed to the developer's later negligent regrading and construction activities in an adjacent section of a master-planned community years after the lot was sold; the homeowners asserted claims under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act for breach of an implied warranty to perform development services in a good and workmanlike manner and for unconscionable conduct, in addition to negligence and other theories. The Texas Supreme Court rejected the DTPA claims, reformed the judgment to eliminate all DTPA-based damages including additional damages and attorney's fees, and deleted a duplicative portion of the property damage award. It affirmed the negligence-based actual damages and out-of-pocket expenses, while upholding the deletion of mental anguish damages. The court's reasoning centered on the conclusion that no implied warranty applied to the developer's services in this context and that the evidence did not support unconscionability or mental anguish under Texas law.

business & regulatorypropertytorts & liability

In Mafrige v. Ross, plaintiffs sued multiple defendants for tort claims including malicious prosecution and negligence arising from prior federal litigation, and the trial court granted several motions for summary judgment using language stating that plaintiffs take nothing against the defendants. The court of appeals dismissed the appeal for want of jurisdiction, concluding the judgments were interlocutory because some motions did not address all causes of action and no severance had occurred. The Texas Supreme Court reversed, holding that inclusion of Mother Hubbard language or its equivalent in a summary judgment order makes the judgment final for appeal purposes even if it disposes of claims not addressed in the motions. The Court reasoned that orders appearing final on their face should be treated as appealable, with any improper granting of relief resolved on the merits rather than through jurisdictional dismissal.

proceduretorts & liability

This case concerns National Union Fire Insurance Company's petition for mandamus relief after the Ninth Court of Appeals withdrew its prior order granting an extension to file an electronic statement of facts in an appeal from an adverse workers' compensation judgment. The Supreme Court of Texas conditionally granted the writ, holding that the court of appeals abused its discretion by applying an erroneous legal standard when it found National's motion failed to reasonably explain the need for the extension. The court explained that under Tex.R.App.P. 54(c), a reasonable explanation encompasses any plausible statement indicating the delay resulted from inadvertence, mistake, or mischance rather than deliberate noncompliance, and National's confusion regarding electronic recording procedures satisfied this standard. As a result, the statement of facts filed by the extended deadline could be considered on appeal.

procedurelabor & employment

Galveston County established a Legal Department with salaried staff attorneys to handle civil legal matters for the county and related entities. Taxpayer Ben Guynes sued, arguing that this arrangement was an unauthorized expenditure, revived an abolished office, and improperly usurped the statutory duties of the elected Criminal District Attorney to represent the county in court. The trial court granted summary judgment for Guynes and enjoined the Department, but the court of appeals reversed. The Texas Supreme Court affirmed, concluding on the undisputed facts that the Commissioners Court could lawfully employ staff attorneys to advise and represent it in civil matters, as the Criminal District Attorney's duties are not exclusive and the arrangement assisted rather than prevented performance of those duties.

criminal lawprocedure

In Graff v. Beard, the Texas Supreme Court addressed whether social hosts could be held civilly liable to third parties for injuries caused by an intoxicated adult guest who consumed alcohol at their party and then drove. The court declined to impose a new common-law duty on social hosts, reversed the court of appeals, and rendered a take-nothing judgment for the hosts. Its core reasoning was that the Texas legislature had considered but rejected social host liability when enacting the dram shop statute (which applies only to commercial providers), that duty is a prerequisite to tort liability, and public policy factors including historical precedent against provider liability weighed against judicial recognition of the duty.

torts & liability

This case concerned whether the Term Contract Nonrenewal Act (TCNA) provided Texas public school teachers with a constitutionally protected property interest in the renewal of their term contracts. The Texas Supreme Court held that the TCNA does create such a property interest because it requires school districts to establish reasons for nonrenewal in advance, thereby limiting their discretion. The court reversed the court of appeals' judgment, which had found no property interest, and remanded the case for further consideration of issues related to damages and attorney's fees. The decision was based on the principle that a substantive limit on state discretion, akin to a "for cause" requirement, establishes a protected property interest under the Fourteenth Amendment.

labor & employmentcivil rights

This case involved a medical malpractice lawsuit by the surviving family of Robert Canavati against several health care providers, including certain physicians, under the Texas Medical Liability and Insurance Improvement Act. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit certified questions to the Texas Supreme Court regarding the Act's notice and limitations provisions. The court held that providing notice to one health care provider tolls the statute of limitations for seventy-five days as to all providers against whom a claim is timely asserted, that each provider is entitled to a separate sixty-day presuit negotiation period, and that claims may be abated beyond the extended limitations period if notice is untimely. The reasoning centered on the statutory language in section 4.01(c) referring to "all parties and potential parties," which the court interpreted to promote predictability without creating collateral fact issues about claimants' knowledge.

healthcareproceduretorts & liability

The Texas Association of Business sued the Texas Air Control Board and Texas Water Commission seeking a declaratory judgment that statutes authorizing those agencies to directly assess civil penalties for violations of air, water, and solid waste regulations violated the Texas Constitution's open courts and jury trial provisions. The agencies and intervenors counterclaimed that the statutes were constitutional. After a bench trial, the trial court upheld the statutes, but the Supreme Court of Texas affirmed the judgment as to the jury trial challenge and reversed as to the open courts challenge. The core reasoning examined the historical shift from court-based enforcement to direct agency penalty assessment, including the requirement that parties post a supersedeas bond or cash deposit equal to the full penalty amount to obtain judicial review, and evaluated this scheme against the constitutional guarantees.

environmentbusiness & regulatoryprocedure

In Twyman v. Twyman, a wife filed for divorce and added a claim for emotional harm, alleging her husband had intentionally and cruelly attempted to force her into deviate sexual acts; the trial court awarded her $15,000 on the emotional distress claim after a bench trial. The court of appeals affirmed based on negligent infliction of emotional distress, but the Texas Supreme Court reversed that judgment because it had recently held that no such cause of action exists in Texas. The court adopted the tort of intentional infliction of emotional distress using the Restatement (Second) of Torts § 46 elements—intentional or reckless conduct that is extreme and outrageous, causing severe emotional distress—and held that such a claim may be brought in a divorce proceeding. Because the pleadings were broad enough to encompass the intentional tort, the court remanded for a new trial rather than affirming on an alternative ground. The decision balances individual freedom of action against redress for truly intolerable conduct while rejecting liability for merely rude or insensitive behavior.

family lawtorts & liability

In this case, plaintiff David Craig sued Remington Arms and another defendant for injuries sustained from a Remington Model 700 rifle that allegedly discharged without the trigger being pulled, claiming negligence and strict products liability. After discovery disputes led to some pretrial sanctions and a special master appointment, the jury returned a verdict for Remington, but the trial court then declared a mistrial, struck Remington's pleadings, entered a default judgment on liability for negligence and gross negligence, and imposed other severe restrictions as discovery sanctions based on alleged pretrial abuse and trial misconduct. The Texas Supreme Court held that the trial court abused its discretion because claims based on known pretrial discovery issues were waived by failing to seek pretrial rulings, the remaining incidents did not justify death penalty sanctions under applicable standards, and Remington lacked an adequate appellate remedy, so it conditionally granted mandamus to vacate the sanctions order.

proceduretorts & liability

In this products liability case, the family of a man who committed suicide after taking the antidepressant Prozac sued manufacturer Eli Lilly and sought discovery of adverse reaction reports submitted to the FDA, including the identities of the reporting physicians and institutions. The trial court ordered disclosure of the reporters' identities (with patients' names redacted) and imposed sanctions for noncompliance, prompting Lilly to seek mandamus relief from the Texas Supreme Court. The court conditionally granted mandamus, holding that the trial court failed to apply the proper legal standard by not adequately weighing the federal regulations protecting reporter confidentiality and the strong public policy interest in preserving voluntary reporting to the FDA for post-approval drug safety monitoring. It reasoned that ordinary appeal would not cure the harm from compelled disclosure and directed the trial court to maintain confidentiality except where the information was unavailable from other sources and necessary to resolve fact issues. The opinion addresses the interplay between state discovery rules and federal confidentiality requirements under 21 C.F.R. § 314.430.

proceduretorts & liabilityfederal powerhealthcare

In this case, Georgette Speer, who is Jewish, applied for a senior adoption worker position at the Presbyterian Children's Home and Service Agency, a nonprofit affiliated with the Presbyterian church that had a policy of hiring only Christians; after being rejected, Speer and the Texas Commission on Human Rights sued under the Texas Commission on Human Rights Act, alleging unlawful religious discrimination. The trial court and court of appeals ruled that the Agency qualified for the Act's exemption for religious organizations. The Texas Supreme Court dismissed the case as moot without addressing the merits, vacating the lower courts' judgments. The core reasoning was that Speer sought only injunctive and declaratory relief, but the Agency had ceased offering adoption services and eliminated the position in 1992, eliminating any live controversy and making the requested relief impossible.

civil rightsreligious libertylabor & employment

This case involved a slip-and-fall incident at an H.E. Butt Grocery store where Tami Warner fell in a puddle of water and chicken blood during a promotion. The trial court submitted only a premises liability theory to the jury, which found in favor of H.E.B., leading to a take-nothing judgment. The court of appeals reversed, finding that Warner had pleaded an additional negligence theory based on failure to pre-bag chickens that should have been submitted. The Texas Supreme Court reversed the court of appeals, holding that Warner's pleadings alleged only a premises liability claim arising from a condition on the premises rather than a negligent activity, and that the trial court's submission of the premises liability questions, though not in broad form, was not harmful error.

torts & liabilityprocedure

This case is a mandamus proceeding in which Chrysler Corporation challenged a trial court's sanctions order in a product liability and wrongful death suit brought by the family of a driver killed in a head-on collision with a drunk driver. The plaintiffs alleged the Dodge Diplomat was defective and not crashworthy, and after years of discovery disputes involving multiple requests, motions to compel, and hearings, the trial court struck Chrysler's pleadings and entered a default judgment on liability for compensatory and punitive damages as a sanction for alleged discovery abuse. Chrysler argued that these 'death penalty' sanctions violated the standards set in Transamerican Natural Gas Corp. v. Powell and Braden v. Downey, which require sanctions to be directly related to the misconduct, no more severe than necessary to ensure compliance, and supported by findings that lesser sanctions would be ineffective. The court reviews the extensive record of discovery exchanges, Chrysler's production of over 80,000 documents, and the trial court's findings of willful noncompliance to determine whether mandamus relief is warranted for a violation of those standards.

proceduretorts & liability

The case involved whether the beneficiaries of a deceased driver could stack the underinsured motorist coverage limits from a single multi-vehicle insurance policy to recover more than the stated per-person and per-accident limits, after paying separate premiums for each vehicle. The Texas Supreme Court affirmed the lower courts' decision that stacking was not permitted. The court reasoned that the policy language was unambiguous in limiting liability to the stated amounts regardless of the number of vehicles covered, and that this limitation did not violate public policy, consistent with prior precedents.

business & regulatorytorts & liability

This case involved a construction contract dispute between the Jack B. Anglin Company and the City of Jacksboro over expenses from remedial work on an earthen dam after a mud slide. The City sued for breach of contract, negligence, and violations of the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, and Anglin sought to compel arbitration under the contract's arbitration clause pursuant to the Federal Arbitration Act or the Texas Arbitration Act. The trial court ordered arbitration only on the breach of contract claim and denied it for the DTPA claim. The Texas Supreme Court conditionally granted mandamus relief, holding that the Federal Act applied because the project affected interstate commerce and that all claims, including those under the DTPA, were subject to arbitration. The court reasoned that Texas procedure governs the determination of arbitrability under the Federal Act and that a summary hearing based on affidavits was sufficient to establish the applicability of the arbitration agreement.

business & regulatoryprocedure