Justia Texas Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Respondent, a former employee of San Antonio Water System (SAWS), sued SAWS under the Texas Commission on Human Rights (TCHRA), alleging that SAWS retaliated against her for opposing a discriminatory employment practice. Specifically, Respondent contended that she was terminated because she confronted a male vice president about his repeated lunch invitations to two female employees outside his department. The jury awarded Respondent nearly $1 million in damages. The court of appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court reversed and dismissed the claim, holding that no reasonable person could have believed that sexual harassment under the TCHRA occurred, and therefore, Respondent did not engage in a protected activity under the TCHRA when she confronted the vice president. View "San Antonio Water Sys. v. Nichols" on Justia Law

Petitioners, administrators at a healthcare facility, allegedly made disparaging comments about Respondent, a certified nurse anesthetist. Respondent filed suit against Petitioners for defamation, among other claims, providing as proof of Petitioners’ disparaging comments several emails Petitioners had sent to four recipients. Petitioners moved to dismiss the claims based on the Texas Citizen Participation Act. The trial court granted the motion to dismiss in part and denied it in part. The court of appeals reversed, concluding that the Act was inapplicable to this case because it does not apply to private communications. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the communications in this case were made in connection with a matter of public concern, and therefore, the Act was applicable to Petitioners’ claims. Remanded. View "Lippincott v. Whisenhunt" on Justia Law

In this commercial dispute, Petitioner obtained a $6 million breach-of-contract and tort judgment against Respondents. After filing the lawsuit, Petitioner assigned its claims to its commercial lender. Respondents filed a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, alleging that Petitioner had no standing to pursue the litigation because it had assigned the claims to the lender. The trial court concluded that Petitioner had standing. The court of appeals vacated the judgment and dismissed for want of jurisdiction. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the court of appeals failed to consider pertinent evidence before the trial court, and therefore, the cause must be remanded to the trial court for reconsideration. View "Vernco Constr., Inc. v. Nelson" on Justia Law

JAW The Pointe, LLC obtained insurance to cover an apartment complex located in Galveston from an insurer that purchased several policies providing multiple layers of coverage for the 300 complexes it insured. Lexington Insurance Company provided the primary coverage layer. Hurricane Ike struck, causing substantial damage to The Pointe apartments. Under city ordinances, JAW was required to be brought into compliance with current code ordinances. The insurance policy covered the costs of complying with city ordinances but only if the policy covered the property damage that triggered the enforcement of the ordinances. In this case, the property damage that triggered the ordinances resulted from wind, which the policy covered, and flooding, which the policy expressly excluded. Lexington informed JAW that the policy did not cover the losses JAW incurred to comply with the ordinances. JAW sued Lexington, asserting claims for violations of the Texas Insurance Code and the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act. The jury returned a verdict in JAW’s favor. The court of appeals reversed, concluding that the policy excluded coverage for JAW’s code-compliance losses. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the policy did not cover JAW’s losses, and thus JAW could not recover for Lexington’s bad faith failure to effectuate a prompt and fair settlement of the claim. View "JAW The Pointe, LLC v. Lexington Ins. Co." on Justia Law

The Fort Bend County Toll Road Authority (the Authority) was a local government corporation created to design, build, and operate the Westpark Tollway. The Authority lawfully contracted with Brown & Gay Engineering, Inc. (Brown & Gay), a private engineering firm, to design and construct the Ford Bend County portion of the Tollway. In 2007, an intoxicated driver entered an exit ramp of the Tollway and collided with a car driven by Pedro Olivares, who was killed in the accident. Plaintiffs sued the Authority and Brown & Gay, alleging that the failure to design and install proper traffic-control devices around the exit ramp proximately caused the decedent’s death. The court of appeals reversed the trial court’s denial of the Authority’s plea to the jurisdiction on governmental-immunity grounds, concluding that the Authority was immune from suit. Brown & Gay then filed its own plea to the jurisdiction seeking the same sovereign-immunity protection that the Authority would enjoy had it performed the work itself. The court of appeals denied relief. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that sovereign immunity does not extend to private contractors based solely on the nature of the contractors’ work. View "Brown & Gay Eng’g, Inc. v. Olivares" on Justia Law

The Texas Student Housing Authority (TSHA) had title to the Cambridge at College Station, a student-residential facility near two college campuses. In the summers of 2005 to 2008, TSHA provided lodging at the Cambridge to non-college students attending university-sponsored instructional programs. The Brazos County Appraisal District (BCAD) voided TSHA’s property-tax-exempt status for the years 2005 to 2008 and assessed millions of dollars of back taxes. The trial court affirmed, concluding that TSHA forfeited the exemption once the Cambridge hosted people who were not students, faculty or staff members of an institution of higher learning. The court of appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that TSHA did not forfeit its exemption under Tex. Educ. Code Ann. 53.46 by housing summer program participants at the Cambridge because the statute imposes no conditions but rather declares the property-tax exemption in absolute terms. View "Tex. Student Housing Auth. v. Brazos County Appraisal Dist." on Justia Law

The State condemned two adjacent parcels of property that the owners had leased to Clear Channel Outdoor Inc. for outdoor advertising. Clear Channel had built a billboard on each parcel. The State maintained that its condemnation of the realty did not include the billboards themselves because they were removable property for which no compensation was due. Consistent with the State’s position, the special commissioners’ awards included no compensation for the billboard structures. The landowners and Clear Channel objected to the awards. In addition, Clear Channel counterclaimed for inverse condemnation of the sign structures. After a jury trial, the trial court awarded Clear Channel $268,235.27 for the billboards less credits for the amounts already received from the commissioners’ award, concluding that a billboard may be a fixture to be valued with the land. The court of appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court reversed, holding (1) Clear Channel’s billboard structures were fixtures and should have been valued as part of the land; and (2) while Clear Channel was due compensation for the sign structures, it was not entitled to value the structures based on the income from its advertising operations, and evidence of that income was inadmissible. Remanded. View "State v. Clear Channel Outdoor, Inc." on Justia Law

Two nonresident minors filed suit against Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations, LLC, the manufacturer of an allegedly defective tire that failed, causing a rollover that killed the children’s parents. The minors sued by a next friend - their uncle - who was a Texas resident. The residents resided in Mexico with their grandparents, who became the children’s legal guardians. Bridgestone filed a motion to dismiss for forum non conveniens, asserting that the case belonged in Mexico, not Texas. The trial court denied the motion. Bridgestone petitioned for writ of mandamus in the court of appeals. The court denied relief, concluding that because the next-friend was a Texas resident the case may not be dismissed on forum-non-conveniens grounds. Bridgestone subsequently sought mandamus relief in the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court conditionally granted Bridgestone’s petition for writ of mandamus and ordered the trial court to dismiss the action, holding (1) Texas law allows minors to sue by next friend when they have a legal guardian who is not authorized to sue in Texas in that capacity; (2) a next friend is not a plaintiff for purposes of the forum-non-conveniens statute’s Texas-resident exception; and (3) therefore, this case must be dismissed as a matter of law. View "In re Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations, LLC" on Justia Law

This dispute arose from the 2010 explosion and sinking of the Deepwater Horizon oil-drilling rig, which killed eleven people and resulted in extensive subsurface discharge of oil into the Gulf of Mexico for nearly three months. The issue in this case concerned the extent of insurance coverage afforded to the oil-field developer, BP, as an additional insured under primary- and excess-insurance policies procured by Deepwater’s owner, Transocean. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit certified to the Supreme Court two questions regarding the interplay between the insurance policies and provisions in a drilling contract giving rise to Transocean’s obligation to name BP as an additional insured. The Court held (1) BP is not entitled to coverage under the Transocean insurance policies for damages arising from the subsurface pollution because BP, not Transocean, assumed liability for such claims; and (2) based on the Court’s analysis of the first issue, it did not reach the second question. View "In re Deepwater Horizon" on Justia Law

A landowner sued its neighbor, the operator of an adjacent wastewater disposal facility, alleging that wastewater had migrated into the deep subsurface of its land, possibility contaminating the groundwater beneath it. The jury returned a verdict in favor of the wastewater disposal facility. After a series of appeals, the court of appeals reversed the jury’s verdict. The Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the court of appeals and reinstated the trial court’s judgment that the wastewater disposal facility take nothing, holding (1) the jury instruction properly included lack of consent as an element of a trespass cause of action that a plaintiff must prove; (2) the trial court properly denied the landowner’s motion for directed verdict on the issue of consent; and (3) there is no need to address the remaining question of whether deep subsurface wastewater migration is actionable as a common law trespass in Texas. View "Envtl. Processing Sys., LC v. FPL Farming Ltd." on Justia Law