Eva Guzman

This case involves a habeas corpus petition by M.P.A., who as a juvenile was adjudicated delinquent for sexually assaulting his seven-year-old cousin based on the victims' testimony and an expert's Abel Assessment results, and was sentenced to twenty years' confinement. The victims later recanted, claiming their mother pressured them to lie, and the expert was later found to have misstated research on the test's validity. The Texas Supreme Court held that M.P.A. failed to prove actual innocence because the habeas court found the recantations not credible, and that his trial counsel was not ineffective for failing to challenge the expert at the adjudication phase. However, the Court concluded that the expert's false testimony contributed to the sentence and therefore granted relief in the form of a new disposition hearing.

criminal lawprocedure

This case involved a dispute over whether Guaranty Bank breached its deposit agreement with a deceased customer's estate after a fraudster used forged documents to drain the account, which the bank later closed. The estate administrator sued the bank for refusing her later demand for payment of the withdrawn funds, and the trial court granted summary judgment to the bank. The court of appeals reversed in the administrator's favor. The Texas Supreme Court affirmed that judgment, holding that the bank had breached the agreement by failing to pay on demand and had not properly raised or preserved affirmative defenses such as account closure or acquiescence in the trial court, unlike in a related case against another bank. The court denied the administrator's cross-petition for attorney's fees because she had not properly presented the issue below.

business & regulatoryprocedure

The case concerned whether the holder of a dishonored check could recover attorney’s fees from the drawer under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code section 38.001(8) when bringing suit for the drawer’s obligation under Uniform Commercial Code section 3.414. Half-Price Checks Cashed sued United Automobile Insurance Company after UAIC’s check was dishonored, prevailed on the underlying claim in the trial court, and was awarded fees; the court of appeals reversed the fee award on the ground that the claim was purely statutory rather than contractual. The Texas Supreme Court held that a holder’s action against a drawer under section 3.414 is a claim on a contract to which section 38.001(8) applies, because the UCC creates an obligation arising from the instrument itself that is treated as contractual. The court therefore reversed the court of appeals and remanded for a determination of attorney’s fees.

business & regulatoryprocedure

In this case before the Texas Multidistrict Litigation Panel, BP requested appointment of a pretrial judge to consolidate eight state court cases in Harris and Galveston Counties arising from the April 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The plaintiffs opposed the motion. The panel denied the request, ruling that the cases were not "related" under Administrative Rule 13 because they involved different allegations, events, and dates after the initial explosion, even though they shared a common origin in the spill. The court explained that a common event alone does not create common questions of fact sufficient for MDL transfer, citing prior decisions such as In re Delta Lloyds and In re Great Lakes Dredge & Dock.

proceduretorts & liabilityenvironment

The case involved the Texas Railroad Commission's decision to grant a permit for an oil and gas waste injection well without considering traffic-safety concerns raised by nearby residents. The Commission interpreted the statutory requirement to weigh the 'public interest' as focused on hydrocarbon production, waste disposal capacity, and environmental protection rather than road damage or safety from truck traffic. The Supreme Court of Texas held that this interpretation was reasonable and consistent with the Texas Water Code's text and the broader statutory scheme governing oil and gas regulation. Accordingly, the Court reversed the court of appeals and upheld the permit, ruling that judicial deference was required to the agency's construction of the ambiguous term.

environmentbusiness & regulatory

This case arose from a 2003 bus crash in which passengers were killed or injured after the vehicle overturned, with claims brought against the manufacturer and distributor for allegedly defective design regarding the absence of passenger seatbelts and the type of window glazing used. The Texas Supreme Court addressed whether federal motor vehicle safety standards, which were silent on seatbelts and permitted multiple glazing options at the time of manufacture, preempted the state common-law tort claims, and separately whether a bankruptcy apportionment plan for insurance proceeds rendered the bus operator a 'settling person' under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Chapter 33. The Court held that the federal standards did not preempt the jury's verdict because it posed no obstacle to the federal regulatory scheme's purposes. It further concluded that the bankruptcy plan, which allowed claimants to litigate with capped recoveries or accept mediated shares, qualified the debtor as a settling person for purposes of proportionate liability allocation. The judgment of the court of appeals was affirmed.

business & regulatoryproceduretorts & liability

The case concerned whether an estate administrator could recover funds from unauthorized withdrawals made from a deceased customer's bank account before her appointment. The Texas Supreme Court held that the administrator's claims were barred by the statute of repose in section 4.406 of the Texas Business and Commerce Code, which requires customers to report unauthorized transactions within one year (or a shorter contractual period) after the bank makes account statements available. The court reasoned that a bank satisfies its obligation to make statements available by retaining them at its offices for retrieval by the appointed administrator, and that the repose period begins to run upon the administrator's appointment rather than at the time of the transactions or the customer's death. Because the administrator was appointed in 2003 but did not notify the bank until 2005, well after the 60-day contractual deadline, the claims were precluded.

business & regulatoryprocedure

The case involved a dispute over the termination of a teacher by Presidio Independent School District after violating a corporal punishment policy. The Commissioner of Education reversed the district's termination decision, and the district appealed to a Travis County district court with the teacher's agreement, but the Commissioner objected to the venue. The Texas Supreme Court held that Texas Education Code § 21.307 does not require the Commissioner's consent for venue in Travis County, as the statute's references to "parties" in the context of appeals refer only to the teacher and school district. The court reversed the court of appeals based on its interpretation of the term "party" consistently throughout the statutory scheme governing teacher termination reviews.

labor & employmentprocedure

In Kelly v. General Interior Construction, Inc., a Texas corporation sued two Arizona residents who were officers of an Arizona contractor for breach of contract, violations of the Texas Trust Fund Act, and fraud arising from a hotel renovation project in Houston. The defendants filed a special appearance challenging personal jurisdiction and provided evidence they were not Texas residents and conducted no business in Texas in their personal capacities. The Texas Supreme Court held that the plaintiffs failed to allege any acts by the defendants in Texas connected to the claims, allowing the defendants to negate all bases for jurisdiction, and dismissed the claims against the officers for lack of personal jurisdiction.

procedurebusiness & regulatory