Dallas Austin

In May 2024, the Texas Supreme Court in Alonzo v. John overturned a $12 million jury verdict because Plaintiffs’ counsel made incurable arguments to the jury. The personal injury case stemmed from a 2012 car accident where Defendant, Robert Alonzo, rear ended a couple in his tractor trailer.  One of Plaintiffs in the case was an African American woman.  Alonzo and his employer, New Prime Inc., admitted liability prior to trial.  As a result, the trial was simply to determine the amount of damages to be awarded to Plaintiffs. At the 2020 trial, defense counsel argued that Lewis, an African

When is an owner liable for personal injuries sustained on its property? In Oxy USA WTP LP v. Bringas, the Houston Court of Appeals (First District) held that Oxy USA WTP LT (“Oxy”), the property owner, was not liable to a third-tier subcontractor under a premise liability, negligent activity or negligence per se theory. In Bringas, Bringas, a third-tier independent contractor to Oxy, was asked to swap out two slide-top waste bins with open-top waste bins at a remote, unmanned compressor station, the Barilla Draw, in the Permian Basin. Bringas opted to perform the work in near complete dar

Is a Texas city liable for breach of a verbal contract? The Corpus Christi Court of Appeals in City of Pharr v. Garcia recently answered the question, no. How did this happen and what is the significance to construction contractors in Texas? In Garcia, Pajaro Promotions sued the City of Pharr alleging that the City failed to pay expenses and a 20% promotor’s fee associated with a Toby Keith concert at the City’s convention center. The City argued that Pajaro’s claims were barred due to sovereign immunity. When the trial court denied the City’s plea to the jurisdiction, the City filed a

When is a policy limits demand insufficient to invoke the Stowers doctrine? The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas in Golden Bear Insurance Co. v. 34th S&S, LLC d/b/a Concrete Cowboy et al. recently held that plaintiffs’ settlement demand did not meet the requirements of the Stowers  doctrine and, therefore, did not expose the insurer to extracontractual damages. Under the nearly 100-year old Stowers doctrine, an insurer may be liable for damages in excess of its policy limits (extracontractual damages) for negligently failing to settle a third-party claim that resul

Earlier this May, the Fourteenth Court of Appeals, held that a federal law, the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act (“EFAA”) that went into law in March 2022, barred a requirement of a former nurse to arbitrate claims connected to her termination after reporting that a patient sexually and inappropriately touched her. In SJ Medical Center, LLC dba St. Joseph Medical Center v. Olanma Destiny Anozie, Anozie worked at St. Joseph’s Center for Behavioral Health (“St. Joseph”) as a registered nurse. In December 2022, as Anozie was walking past a mental hea

Is a product manufacturer that complies with federally adopted standards liable for damages under Texas’s statutory product liability law? The Texas Supreme Court in American Honda Motor Company, Inc. v. Milburn, recently addressed a product liability case in which the main issues on appeal was whether Honda defectively designed a seatbelt system that caused severe injuries to Sarah Milburn and whether Texas’s product liability statute, contained in Chapter 82 of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Section 82.008, shielded Honda from liability. Section 82.008 entitles a product man

What is “surface water” and how can diverting it create liability under Texas law?  In Good River Farms, L.P. v. TXI Materials, L.P., the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, interpreting Texas law, recently answered these questions. In October 2017, Good River Farms, L.P. (Good River) filed suit against TXI Operations, L.P. and Martin Marietta Materials, Incorporated (Martin Marietta) asserting claims for nuisance, negligence, and violations of the Texas Water Code. The dispute between Good River and Martin Marietta stemmed from a “120-year flood” that occurred near