Excel Corp. v. Valdez

• Decision Date: 11 April 1996
• Docket Number: No. 13-96-087-CV,13-96-087-CV
• Citation: 921 S.W.2d 444
• Parties: EXCEL CORPORATION, et al., Relators, v. Honorable Rogelio VALDEZ, Presiding Judge of the 357th District Court of Cameron County, Texas, Respondent.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

Page 444

921 S.W.2d 444

EXCEL CORPORATION, et al., Relators, v. Honorable Rogelio VALDEZ, Presiding Judge of the 357th District Court of Cameron County, Texas, Respondent.

No. 13-96-087-CV.

Court of Appeals of Texas,

Corpus Christi.

April 11, 1996.

On Petition for Writ of Mandamus.

Robert L. Craig, Craig Terrill & Hale, Llp, Lubbock, David G. Oliveira, Roerig, Oliveira & Fisher, Brownsville, Hugh Norwood Lyle, Craig Terrill & Hale Llp, Lubbock, Rene O. Oliveira, Roerig Oliveira & Fisher, Brownsville, for Relators.

Frank Costilla, Costilla & Stapleton, Brownsville, Sam L. Fadduol, Fadduol & Glasheen, Lubbock, Frank L. Branson, Dallas, George A. Quesada, Law Offices of Frank L. Branson, Dallas, Kevin Glasheen, Fadduol & Glasheen, Lubbock, James A. Besselman, Underwood, Wilson, Berry, Stein & Johnson, Amarillo, Christiana Dijkman, Brownsville, R.E. Lopez, Jr., Brownsville, for real parties in interest.

Before SEERDEN, C.J., and YANEZ and CHAVEZ, JJ.

OPINION

YANEZ, Justice.

In this original mandamus proceeding, relators, Excel Corp., Jerry Ruthardt, and Hereford Services, complain of an order by which one district court in Cameron County has transferred to itself, and taken away from another district court, the underlying personal injury lawsuit by the Samaniegos ¹ against relators. We deny mandamus relief.

On March 30, 1995, the Samaniegos filed in Cameron County the underlying lawsuit against relators for injuries sustained by Baltazar Samaniego in one of Excel's meat packing plants in the Texas Panhandle. The lawsuit was randomly assigned to the 197th District Court. Specifically, Samaniego sued Excel Corp., Cargill, Inc. (parent company of Excel), Hereford Service, Inc., Jerry Ruthardt (employee of Excel), and John Doe (independent contractor), and claimed that venue was proper in Cameron County based on defendant Cargill's presence there. Samaniego alleged that he was burned by an overflowing mixture of hot acid and water while doing repair work underneath a tank and that Excel was not covered by worker's compensation insurance at the time of the injury. Accordingly, Samaniego brought causes of action for negligence and gross negligence against the relators.

Excel and Ruthardt filed an answer in the 197th District Court generally denying the allegations in Samaniego's petition and moving to transfer venue. Specifically, Excel denied that venue is proper in Cameron County, that Cargill operates or directs the management of Excel, that Excel and Cargill are the same entity or that Excel does business as Cargill, Inc. Excel raised affirmative defenses of unavoidable accident, new and intervening cause, and federal preemption of the negligence causes of action by ERISA. ²

Samaniego then filed in the 357th District Court a Motion to Transfer/Consolidate ³, alleging that the same attorneys representing Samaniego had filed some 200 other lawsuits against Excel in Cameron County involving similar questions of law and/or facts, and that the first of those lawsuits was filed in the 357th District Court. Samaniego acknowledged that many of the lawsuits filed in the other district courts of Cameron County had been removed to federal court, but further alleged that they are the subject of motions to remand. Accordingly, Samaniego requested the 357th District Court to order transfer and consolidation of the present case under provisions of the local rules for transfer of related cases to the court in which the earliest such case was filed.

However, Excel opposed the motion, responding that the other lawsuit in the 357th District Court upon which transfer and consolidation were sought involved a knife injury at another Excel plant, that the two cases are unrelated, and further that the removal of that case divested the 357th District Court of jurisdiction to transfer and consolidate the Samaniego case with it.

The case upon which Samaniego sought transfer and consolidation was filed on May 6, 1994, by Maria Guerra Cardenas against Excel, Cargill, and Steve Steffe (agent of Excel and Cargill), for personal injuries in a separate Excel meat packing plant in the Texas Panhandle. Cardenas had made similar allegations that Cargill directs the management of Excel and that venue was proper in Cameron County due to the presence of Cargill there. She alleged that Excel did not carry worker's compensation insurance, and brought causes of action for negligence and gross negligence based on an injury that she received in some unspecified manner while working on the "wizzard knives," which she claims to have occurred as a result of repetitious trauma associated with Excel's indifference to the workers' needs and injuries. Cardenas' case was randomly assigned to the 357th District Court. Excel and Steffe answered the Cardenas case, generally denying the allegations in her petition and moving to transfer venue. Specifically, Excel denied that Cargill controls and directs the management of Excel, that it does business as Cargill, Inc., or that venue is proper in Cameron County. Excel raised affirmatively the defenses of sole proximate cause, unavoidable accident, new and intervening cause, and preemption by ERISA.

The 357th District Court heard the motion to transfer and consolidate on November 2, 1995. The parties agreed that the Cardenas case had been removed and was still pending in federal court under motion to remand. ⁴ The trial judge indicated that he would grant Samaniego's motion to transfer and consolidate, but also stated that he would confer with the 197th District Court to determine which court should try the case. The 357th District Court then adjourned the hearing, with no testimony or other evidence having been offered or received. On November 3, 1995, the 357th District Court signed an order transferring the Samaniego case from the 197th District Court to the 357th District Court, but the order said nothing about consolidation with the Cardenas case.

By the present mandamus proceeding, Excel claims that the 357th District Court abused its discretion in granting the motion to transfer and consolidate, both because the Cardenas lawsuit had been removed to federal court and deprived the 357th District Court of jurisdiction to consolidate a case with it in state court, and because, even absent the removal, the Samaniego and Cardenas cases were not sufficiently related to justify transfer and consolidation under the local rules.

We note initially that, contrary to the representations of the relators, the only order entered by the 357th District Court in the underlying case is for transfer of the Samaniego case to the 357th District Court, and there is no written order for its consolidation with the Cardenas case. See State Farm Insurance Co. v. Pults, 850 S.W.2d 691, 693 (Tex.App.--Corpus Christi 1993, no writ) (order must be reduced to writing, signed by the trial court, and entered in the record). Accordingly, we see no jurisdictional problem caused by the pendency of the Cardenas case in the federal court, which is only relevant to the extent that it would affect the trial court's evaluation of whether transfer would be expedient and proper under the local rules.

The Texas Constitution and the Texas Government Code authorize district courts within the same county to transfer cases, exchange benches, and to provide local rules for the administration of such transfers and exchanges. Tex. Const. art V, § 11; Tex.Gov't Code Ann. §§ 24.303, 74.093 (Vernon 1988 & Supp.1996). Accordingly, litigants do not have a protected proprietary interest in having their cases heard by a particular district judge or court within the county of filing. See European Crossroads' Shopping Center, Ltd. v. Criswell, 910 S.W.2d 45, 51 (Tex.App.--Dallas 1995, no writ); Starnes v. Holloway, 779 S.W.2d 86, 97 (Tex.App.--Dallas 1989, writ denied).

Specifically Texas Government Code § 24.303(a) provides:

In any county in which there are two or more district courts, the judges of those courts may, in their discretion, either in termtime or vacation, on motion of any party or on agreement of the parties, or on their own motion, transfer any civil or criminal case or proceeding on their dockets to the docket of one of those other district courts.

In addition, Texas Government Code § 74.093 provides in pertinent part:

(a) The district and statutory county court judges in each county shall, by majority vote, adopt local rules of administration.

(b) The rules must provide for:

(1) assignment, docketing, transfer, and hearing of all cases, subject to jurisdictional limitations of the district courts and statutory county courts;....

Following the mandate of section 74.093, Cameron County Civil Court Rule 1.1, concerning the filing, assignment and transfer of cases among the district courts in Cameron County, provides in pertinent part:

A. All civil cases, except as otherwise provided herein or by Court order, shall be filed in the District Courts (and any district court hereafter created) in random order.

* * * * * *

D. Except as hereinafter provided, after assignment to a particular Court, every case shall remain pending in such Court until final disposition, unless transferred pursuant to these rules, state statute, or Court order.

E. Every motion for consolidation or joint hearing of two or more cases under Rule 174(a), Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, shall be filed in the earliest case filed.

F. Transfer of Cases:

* * * * * *

2. Whenever any pending case is so related to another case previously filed in or disposed of by another District Court of Cameron County that a transfer of the later case to such other Court would facilitate orderly and...