Doyal v. Texas Dept. of Criminal

• Decision Date: 12 November 2008
• Docket Number: No. 10-07-00103-CV.,10-07-00103-CV.
• Citation: 276 S.W.3d 530
• Parties: Mark E. DOYAL, Appellant, v. TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE-INSTITUTIONAL DIVISION, Mr. Gary Johnson, Ms. Janie Cockrell, John Gilbert, Richard C. Thaler, Robert R. Chance, Timothy C. Simmons, Austin B. McComb, Jr., Roger D. Sanford, Michael E. Tindall, Craig B. Price, Appellee.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

276 S.W.3d 530

Mark E. DOYAL, Appellant, v. TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE-INSTITUTIONAL DIVISION, Mr. Gary Johnson, Ms. Janie Cockrell, John Gilbert, Richard C. Thaler, Robert R. Chance, Timothy C. Simmons, Austin B. McComb, Jr., Roger D. Sanford, Michael E. Tindall, Craig B. Price, Appellee.

No. 10-07-00103-CV.

Court of Appeals of Texas, Waco.

November 12, 2008.

Mark E. Doyal, Edinburg, pro se.

Harold J. Liller, Asst. Atty. Gen., Austin, for appellee.

Before Chief Justice GRAY, Justice VANCE, and Justice REYNA.

OPINION

BILL VANCE, Justice.

Appellant Mark Doyal, a prison inmate at all relevant times, filed a pro se suit against the Texas Department of Criminal Justice—Institutional Division (TDCJ) and a number of TDCJ officials and employees (collectively the "Defendants") for personal injuries he sustained when a cell door was closed on his left hand and crushed his thumb.¹ The Defendants filed a plea to the jurisdiction on sovereign immunity and a no-evidence motion for summary judgment based on the applicability of Government Code section 497.096. The trial court sustained the plea to the jurisdiction on sovereign immunity, granted the motion, and dismissed Doyal's suit. Doyal appeals. We will reverse and remand.

Plea to the Jurisdiction

A plea to the jurisdiction challenges the trial court's authority to determine the subject matter of the action. Texas Dep't Transp. v. Jones, 8 S.W.3d 636, 638 (Tex.1999). Whether the trial court has subject matter jurisdiction is a question of law that we review de novo. Texas Natural Resource Comm'n v. IT-Davy, 74 S.W.3d 849, 855 (Tex.2002). The plaintiff has the burden of alleging facts that affirmatively establish the trial court's subject-matter jurisdiction. Texas Ass'n Bus. v. Texas Air Control Bd., 852 S.W.2d 440, 446 (Tex.1993). In determining whether jurisdiction exists, we accept the allegations in the pleadings as true and construe them liberally in favor of the plaintiff. Texas Dep't Parks & Wildlife v. Miranda, 133 S.W.3d 217, 227 (Tex.2004); Texas Ass'n Bus., 852 S.W.2d at 446.

"[S]overeign immunity deprives a trial court of subject matter jurisdiction for lawsuits in which the state or certain governmental units have been sued unless the state consents to suit." Id. at 224. The Texas Tort Claims Act provides a limited waiver of sovereign immunity and allows suits against governmental units only in certain narrow circumstances. Texas Dep't Crim. Justice v. Miller, 51 S.W.3d 583, 587 (Tex.2001). We look to the terms of the Tort Claims Act to determine the scope of waiver and then consider the particular facts of the case before us to determine whether the case comes within that scope. Id.; Kerrville State Hosp. v. Clark, 923 S.W.2d 582, 584 (Tex.1996).

The Tort Claims Act includes a limited waiver of the state's immunity from suits alleging (1) personal injury proximately caused by the wrongful act or omission or the negligence of an employee acting within her scope of employment if the personal injury arises from the operation or use of motor-driven equipment and the employee would be personally liable to the claimant under Texas law; or (2) personal injury so caused by a condition or use of tangible personal or real property if the governmental unit, were it a private person, would be liable to the claimant under Texas law. See TEX. CIV. PRAC. & REM.CODE ANN. §§ 101.021, 101.025 (Vernon 2005); Act of May 17, 1985, 69th Leg., R.S., ch. 959, § 1, 1985 Tex. Gen. Laws 3242, 3303 (current version at § 101.022 (Vernon Supp.2008)).²

In their plea to the jurisdiction, the Defendants assert that Doyal failed to allege a cause of action for which sovereign immunity has been waived under the Tort Claims Act. Doyal's live pleading (his amended petition filed on November 2, 2005) as of the trial court's February 12, 2007 dismissal order alleges the following:

On August 31, 2000, Plaintiff Mark E. Doyal, suffered personal injury when his left thumb and left hand were crushed and fractured in the motor-driven cell door equipment caused by the negligent operation or use of the motor-driven cell door equipment by the defendant's employee Kimberly A. Williams, and is liable to Plaintiff according to Texas law and while acting in the course and scope of her employment.

The defendant's employee Kimberly A. Williams, while acting in the course and scope of employment and through the negligent operation or use of the motor-driven cell door equipment without any communication or verbal warning to Plaintiff engaged the motor-driven cell door equipment to close, thus, crushing Plaintiff's left thumb and left hand and causing it fractures. The negligence that led to the injury occurred at the Estelle Unit, 264 FM 3478, Huntsville Walker County, Texas, on cellblock D2-Wing at cell number 316.

Officer Darci Roberts who was employed by the defendant on the date in question and working as a rover on the floor of cellblock D2-Wing at the Estelle Unit and while escorting and assisting Plaintiff down the stairs of the cellblock from three row and taking Plaintiff to the infirmary for his injuries sustained from this accident stated to officer Kimberly A. Williams "I didn't tell you to close the cell doors. You shouldn't have done so until I gave you the all clear signal and command to close the cell doors." Officer Kimberly A. Williams in fear of losing her job as a correctional officer replied to Officer Darci Roberts "I am not going to get burned for this one," and then stated to Plaintiff Doyal to "give me your I.D. card." Plaintiff Doyal sustained permanent injuries and disfigurement to his left thumb and left hand when it was crushed and fractured in the motor-driven cell door equipment and had to be rushed to UTMB-Hospital Galveston to undergo emergency reconstructive hand surgery for his injuries suffered to reconstruct his left hand and left thumb and have a metal screw surgically implanted in his left thumb to hold it together.

If Officer Kimberly A. Williams would have at least given Plaintiff a verbal warning or signal or relayed any type of verbal communication or signal that she was engaging the motor-driven cell door equipment and closing the cell door, or at least had waited for an all clear verbal warning, signal or command from Officer Darci Roberts to close the motor-driven cell door equipment, the injuries that Plaintiff has suffered and sustained through Officer Kimberly A. Williams negligence, could in all probability have been avoided.

Doyal also pled a premises liability claim, alleging a premises defect and a special defect under the Tort Claims Act.³

The supreme court has analyzed the waiver of sovereign immunity for a state employee's negligence arising from the operation or use of motor-driven equipment in a case involving a stationary electric motor-driven pump to dissipate gas fumes:

The Tort Claims Act does not define "motor-driven equipment." It provides only that:

"Motor-driven equipment" does not include:

(A) equipment used in connection with the operation of floodgates or water release equipment by river authorities created under the laws of this state; or

(B) medical equipment, such as iron lungs, located in hospitals.

TEX. CIV. PRAC. & REM.CODE § 101.001(4).

We hold that the pump is "motor-driven equipment" for two reasons. First, the pump falls within the generally accepted meaning of "motor-driven equipment." "Equipment," which is not specially defined either by the Tort Claims Act or an opinion of this Court, generally means "[t]he articles or implements used for a specific purpose or activity." BLACK'S LAW DICTIONARY 558 (7th ed.1999). "Motor-driven" means, quite simply, driven by a motor. The pump in this case was an implement used for the purpose of dissipating fumes. It was driven—or made to perform its task—by a motor. It therefore fits the general definition of "motor-driven equipment."

The Seventh Court of Appeals, in 4 DG's Corp., 853 S.W.2d at 857, followed this same reasoning. In that case, the owner of a house near a governmental unit's sewage-removal pumps sued the governmental unit when a power outage caused the pumps to fail. Id. at 856. Sewage backed up into the owner's house, and the owner alleged that an employee of the governmental unit negligently failed to determine whether the pumps were operable after the power stopped. Id. The court of appeals reversed the trial court's summary judgment for the governmental unit based on sovereign immunity, reasoning that the sewage pumps, which were "energized by motors, and . . . used in the city's operation of its sanitary sewer system," could fit within the meaning of "motor-driven equipment." Id. at 857. This construction of "motor-driven equipment" comports with the words' common-sense, plain-language meaning. . . . We conclude that the TNRCC's stationary electric motor-driven pump is within the scope of section 101.021's "motor-driven equipment."

Texas Natural Resource Conservation Comm'n v. White, 46 S.W.3d 864, 868-69 (Tex.2001).

Under the same analysis, we hold that the electric motor-driven cell door as alleged in Doyal's petition is "motor-driven equipment" under the Tort Claims Act. We further hold that Doyal's petition adequately pleads that his personal injury was proximately caused by the TDCJ's employee's negligence in the operation or use of the motor-driven cell door and states a claim under section 101.021(1) of the Tort Claims Act. See id. at 869 ("`Use' means to put or bring into action or service; to employ for or apply to a given purpose.' In addition, the equipment's use must have actually caused the injury.") (citations omitted); City of Paris v. Floyd, 150 S.W.3d 224, 228-29 (Tex App.-Texarkana 2004, no pet.) (pleadings sufficiently raised issue of whether city was negligent in its operation or use of motor-driven equipment for purposes of waiving sovereign immunity under Tort Claims Act where pleadings alleged city failed to...