David Coale, former head of the State Bar appellate section, has started a new blog about the Fifth Circuit. It’s called 600 Camp, after the address of the John Minor Wisdom Courthouse in New Orleans.

Mandatory appellate mediation turns out to be mandatory

Disputing has a post about what happens when a party walks out before a court-ordered appellate mediation has run its course. The title gives away the ending: “Texas Court of Appeals Dismisses Appeal Because Appellant Walked Out of the Court-Ordered Mediation”

This happened in the Waco Court of Appeals. The court’s notice specified that dismissal would follow if the appellant did not attend the mediation. The court’s opinion is here.

Election season is underway

Morgan Smith of the Texas Tribune has the first piece I’ve seen about the 2012 court elections. Her story is about former Justice Steve Smith’s filing to, once again, run against Justice Willett for the Republican nomination.

Oral Arguments This Week

You can check out past and current arguments on the St. Mary’s video archives page.

Tuesday

• SafeShred, Inc. v. Louis Martinez, III, No. 10-0426. Are there exemplary damages for a Sabine Pilot claim (wrongful firing for an employee refusing to do an illegal act) and, if so, was the amount of exemplary damages awarded here excessive? (>> earlier post)

• Shell Oil Company, et al. v. Ralph Ross, No. 10-0429. Broadly, the case is about how the statute of limitations applies to royalty claims when there is an allegation of fraudulent concealment.

• Weeks Marine, Inc. v. Maximino Garza, No. 10-0435. A Jones Act (maritime) case about how to divide responsibility between the worker and the employer. >> earlier post

Wednesday

• Natural Gas Pipeline Company of America v. William Justiss, et al., No. 10-0451. In a nuisance claim about a reduction in property value alleged to have been caused by the gas pipeline: (1) how much worse must the condition get to re-start the statute of limitations and (2) what evidence is proper to show the reduction in property value? A potentially much broader issue here is the petitioner’s request for the Court to limit the “property owner rule” that (traditionally) lets an owner testify as to its value without the need to hire an expert witness.

• Hearts Bluff Game Ranch, Inc. v. The State Of Texas and the Texas Water Development Board, No. 10-0491. Can the State’s actions, which were alleged to have directly interfered with the issuance of a federal permit, constitute a taking under state law? >> earlier Texas Tribune article

• Matthew W. Wasserman, M.D. v. Christina Bergeron Gugel, No. 10-0513. Do “health care liability claims” include allegations of assault or sexual assault by health-care providers? >> earlier post

Thursday

• Port Elevator-Brownsville, LLC V. Rogelio Casados, et al., No. 10-0523. Does the bar against lawsuits created by the workers compensation law apply equally to suits by temporary workers?

• In re United Scaffolding, Inc., No. 10-0526. How much specificity is needed in an order granting a new trial based on the great weight of the evidence?

• Rusk State Hospital v. Dennis Black, et al., No. 10-0548. What should courts do when a government agency raises sovereign immunity during a limited interlocutory appeal challenging something completely different?

Last week, roughly a year after the April 2010 runoff, Rick Green filed a libel suit against several political detractors (including former Chief Justice Phillips and the Texas Association of Realtors), as well as the Texas Tribune and one of its reporters.

The original petition, filed in Hays County, contends that:

A damaged reputation and impressions and opinions of distrust, dishonesty and a lack of ethics and integrity has likely resulted in voters not voting for Green and in many people across Texas and the nation not wanting to have anything to do with Green.

Hat tip: Tex Parte Blog (Texas Lawyer)

Place 3

Debra Lehrmann (R)-I	2,902,897	59.88%
Jim Sharp (D)	1,805,723	37.25%
William Bryan Strange, III (L)	138,567	2.85%

Place 5

Paul Green (R)-I	2,898,421	60.02%
Bill Moody (D)	1,785,890	36.98%
Tom Oxford (L)	143,999	2.98%

Place 9

Eva Guzman (R)-I	2,917,555	60.31%
Blake Bailey (D)	1,722,237	35.60%
Jack Armstrong (L)	197,566	4.08%

These outcomes fairly closely track the performance of other statewide Republican candidates in contested races, in which Republican incumbents received around 60% of the vote.¹

Other Appellate Elections

The two most interesting contests of the night were in the Thirteenth Court and the Third Court. (In each of the other contested races for the court of appeals, the Republican incumbent won with at least 56% of the vote.)

Thirteenth Court: Perkes defeats Yañez

The only incumbent to lose was Linda Yañez of the Thirteenth Court of Appeals (in Corpus Christi/Edinburg), who had first been appointed to the Court in 1993. She lost to Greg Perkes, an appellate lawyer from Corpus Christi.

The Yañez/Perkes race was the closest appellate contest of the night. With 100% of the precincts reporting:

Third Court: Goodwin wins the open seat

The race for the open seat on the Third Court received a great deal of attention locally in Austin. In part, that was because Democratic nominee Kurt Kuhn had drawn a wide range of Republican supporters, including several former Justices of the Texas Supreme Court.

But in the voting booth, the night’s pattern of a Republican sweep continued. With 100% of precincts reporting:

1. The exception was Governor Perry, of course, who obtained roughly 55% of the vote in a significantly more contested race.

For place 3, Debra Lehrmann (61.77%) leads Jim Sharp (35.63%). For place 5, Paul Green (61.92%) leads Bill Moody (35.35%). And for place 9, Eva Guzman (62.04%) leads Blake Bailey (34.15%).

Those numbers are fairly similar to the current statewide totals for other Republican incumbents, with the Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General, and other incumbents with contested races (other than the Governor) with totals in the 61% to 65% range. The governor’s race is only slightly tighter, with Rick Perry over 57%.

(I’m posting a few other election-related thoughts on the blog’s twitter feed as things unfold. I’ll also have a wrap-up post tomorrow.)

So far, the fall campaigns — at least for the Texas Supreme Court — have generated less media interest than did the primary contests. I’ve tried to keep up with the most recent stories on the blog’s “Elections 2010″ page, but I have probably missed some coverage. (If you see something that I should add, feel free to send me an email.)

The Tribune’s interview format is a nice hybrid between a traditional article and a transcript. It condenses and distills some key points, but also embeds short audio clips that give more context for her answers.

Judge Lehrmann will be assuming Place 3, the seat of Justice O”Neill, who a few weeks ago formally notified the Governor that she would be stepping down on June 20, 2010.

Place 3 is up for election this fall, and Justice Lehrmann is already the Republican nominee for that seat. On the fall ballot, she is opposed by Justice Jim Sharp (D) and William Strange (L).

More links about the election, including a short Q&A with soon-to-be Justice Lehrmann, are collected on our Elections 2010 page.

The results:

The news was easy to follow on Twitter, with the AP calling the race, with Debra Lehrmann making a statement, and with Rick Green making his own.

The Texas Tribune has a map showing the runoff election results by county. Get it while it’s hot.

Turnout is not expected to be heavy; some pundits suggest that the statewide race may be decided by those areas of the state that happen to also have other runoff races, such as for state representative, that might drive more voters to the polls.

I have updated the “2010 Elections” page with a few more articles about the runoff. Once the returns start coming in tomorrow, I will be talking about them on the blog’s twitter feed and (eventually) in a wrap-up blog post here.

It’s now official: you can read about the Texas Supreme Court election results from November 2010.

There were two contested primary elections for the Texas Supreme Court. The results are:

Place 3

In a remarkably close six-way election, Rick Green and Debra Lehrmann appear set for an April 13th runoff for the Republican nomination to Place 3 on the Texas Supreme Court.

With 99.98% (all but two) of Texas’s precincts reporting:¹

Jeff Brown	188,033	16.73%
Rick Green	212,788	18.93%
Debra Lehrmann	204,537	18.20%
Jim Moseley	203,717	18.13%
Rebecca Simmons	202,595	18.03%
Rick Strange	111,871	9.95%

The top two vote getters make the runoff. Rick Green finished first with 18.96%.²

The margin between 2nd (Debra Lehrmann) and 3rd (Jim Moseley) to qualify for the runoff appears to be just about 1,000 votes out of more than 1.1 million votes cast in this primary. The margin between 3rd (Jim Moseley) and 4th (Rebecca Simmons) is roughly the same.

That’s a very thin margin, and these results might still change as provisional ballots or other votes are counted.

The winner of the April 13th runoff will face Jim Sharp (D) and William Strange (L) on the November ballot.

Place 9

As noted last night, Justice Eva Guzman has staved off a primary challenge from Rose Vela.

Justice Guzman will face Blake Bailey (D) and Jack Armstrong (L) on the November ballot.

1. Updated to reflect numbers accurate as of 12:48 p.m. on March 3. As votes continue to trickle in, the numbers have closed slightly, with Lehrmann down from 18.22% to 18.20% and Moseley up from 18.12% to 18.13%.
2. This was a six-way race, so everyone expected a runoff, but the evenness of this race was pretty remarkable. I am going to study those numbers a little more, once they are finalized.