Colonial Pipeline Co., Texaco Inc., In re

• Decision Date: 05 December 1997
• Docket Number: No. 13-97-808-CV,13-97-808-CV
• Citation: 960 S.W.2d 272
• Parties: In re COLONIAL PIPELINE COMPANY, TEXACO INC., et al.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

Page 272

960 S.W.2d 272

In re COLONIAL PIPELINE COMPANY, TEXACO INC., et al.

No. 13-97-808-CV.

Court of Appeals of Texas Corpus Christi.

Dec. 5, 1997.

Morgan L. Copeland, Jr., Knox D. Nunnally, Scott Statham, Vinson & Elkins, Reynaldo Ortiz, McAllen, L. Joseph Loveland, Michael W. Perrin, Charles Thomas Kruse, Sashe D. Dimitroff, Tracey Maria Robertson, King & Spalding, Houston, Eduardo R. Rodriguez, Rodriguez, Colvin & Chaney, Brownsville, Rene O. Oliveira, Roerig, Oliveira, & Fisher, Brownsville, Gary L. Gurwitz, McAllen, Hubert

Oxford, III, Beaumont, Robert W. Craft, Beaumont, Dale Jefferson, Beckenstein & Oxford, Houston, Israel Ramon, Jr., Law Offices of Israel Ramon, Jr., McAllen, for Relator.

Bruce L. Jamison, Jamison & Associates, Houston, Frank Rodriguez, McAllen, for Real Parties in Interest.

Before DORSEY, YANEZ and RODRIGUEZ, JJ.

ORDER

DORSEY, Justice.

Relators filed a joint petition for writ of mandamus and supporting brief on November 7, 1997. The Real Parties in Interest responded, upon suggestion of this Court, and filed an appropriate brief. Upon reviewing the authorities of the parties, the petition for writ of mandamus is DENIED.

At issue in the mandamus is the authority of a trial judge to control complex litigation on file in his court. The present litigation involves over seventeen thousand plaintiffs who have filed suits in three Texas counties. The action from which the petition for writ of mandamus arose is pending in Hidalgo County and has over three thousand plaintiffs. The order complained of here is a docket-control order that allowed ten representative plaintiffs to go to trial first, with certain deadlines for discovery applying to those ten. The order abated discovery for the remaining plaintiffs.

The controlling case from the Texas Supreme Court addressing the discretion of the trial judge to control complex litigation through docket-control orders is Polaris Investment Mgt. Corp. v. Abascal, 892 S.W.2d 860 (Tex.1995). Polaris holds these types of docket-control orders are incidental rulings of the court and are not reviewable by mandamus. Polaris is essentially indistinguishable from the case before us and is determinative.

Relators completely ignored Polaris in their filings in this Court, although filing a thirty-seven-page brief containing three pages of authorities in the index. Relators did not attempt to explain or distinguish this controlling authority, nor mention Polaris might be considered to be contrary to their position. In their response to Relators' petition for mandamus, the Real Parties in Interest cite Polaris and state the case was extensively argued before the trial judge, the Honorable Fernando Mancias, when the proposed docket-control order was being considered.

Texas Disciplinary Rule of Professional Conduct 3.03(a)(4) provides: "A lawyer shall not knowingly ... fail to disclose to the tribunal authority in the controlling jurisdiction known to the lawyer to be directly adverse to the position of the client and not disclosed by opposing counsel...." Comment three to rule 3.03 says:

Legal argument based on a knowingly false representation of law...