Gonzalez v. Guilbot

• Decision Date: 11 June 2010
• Docket Number: No. 08-0961,08-0961
• Citation: 315 S.W.3d 533
• Parties: Maria del Carmen Guilbot Serros de GONZALEZ, et al., Petitioners, v. Miguel Angel Gonzalez GUILBOT, Carlos A. Gonzalez Guilbot, and Maria Rosa del Arenal de Gonzalez, Respondents
• Court: Texas Supreme Court

315 S.W.3d 533

Maria del Carmen Guilbot Serros de GONZALEZ, et al., Petitioners,

v.Miguel Angel Gonzalez GUILBOT, Carlos A. Gonzalez Guilbot, and Maria Rosa del Arenal de Gonzalez, Respondents

No. 08-0961

Supreme Court of Texas

Argued Jan. 21, 2010

Decided June 11, 2010

Rehearing Denied August. 20, 2010

Daryl L. Moore, Daryl L. Moore, P.C., Hector Garcia Longoria, Heard Robins Cloud & Lubel LLP, Houston, TX, Thornas R. Phillips, Martha G. Newton, Baker Botts L.L.P., Austin, TX, for Petitioners.

Andres Perez-Chaumont, Armando Lopez, Armando Lopez, P.C., William "Andy" Taylor, Andy Taylor & Associates, P.C., Eric D. Nielsen, The Nielsen Law Firm, P.C., Houston, TX, for Respondents.

Justice WILLETT delivered the opinion of the Court.

This appeal concerns two issues: (1) the procedure required to revest a state court with jurisdiction after remand from federal court, and (2) the definition of "tertiary recusal motion" in Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code section 30.016. We agree with the court of appeals that the hand-filing of a remand order in state court is sufficient to transfer jurisdiction back to state court. However, the court of appeals erred in holding that section 30.016's reference to a "tertiary recusal motion" is limited to a third motion filed by the same party against the same judge. Accordingly, we affirm the court of appeals' judgment in part and reverse it in part, and remand to that court with instructions.

I. Background

This intra-family dispute concerns the ownership and control of several food and beverage businesses formerly owned by Miguel Angel Luis Gonzalez y Vallejo, now deceased. Miguel was married to Maria del Carmen Guilbot Serros de Gonzalez, and together they had nine children. When Miguel died in 2003, his will was probated in Harris County. In May 2004, Maria, individually and as independent administrator of Miguel's estate, along with several of the children (Plaintiffs)¹ filed suit in probate court against several defendants including two of Miguel and Maria's sons, Carlos and Miguel (Defendants), for stealing from the family businesses. In June 2006, Judge Mike Wood determined that Defendants had produced forged stock certificates during discovery in order to claim majority ownership of certain family businesses. Judge Wood issued sanctions prohibiting Defendants from further claiming or disputing ownership of the corporations, and set a trial on damages for January 8, 2007.

A. Remand

On November 14, 2006, Judge Wood gave notice of a hearing to be held November 27. Before the hearing, Defendants removed the case to federal district court alleging there was complete diversity of citizenship. Nevertheless, Plaintiffs' counsel, Hector Longoria, appeared at the hearing and spoke with Judge Wood in open court and on the record. When Judge Wood asked about the status of the case, Longoria replied that the case had been removed, and that he was "going to do what I need to do to try to get it remanded back to here." Judge Wood stated, "I've had a lot of experience in removals.... I can't do anything." Judge Wood cautioned Longoria to "read carefully the statutes," and told him that "if the Order of Remand comes, then I would suggest that you bring a certified copy of it and give it to the clerk of this Court."

On December 14, 2006, the federal district court signed and entered an order of remand and ordered Defendants to pay $7,500 in attorney fees because Defendants had "no objectively reasonable basis to believe removal of this case was proper." That same day, the court provided to Longoria certified copies of the federal court docket sheet, memorandum on remand, and order of remand. The docket sheet indicates that these were given to "plaintiff's counsel so that they can be expedited by hand delivery to Harris County Court no. 2." Longoria hand-delivered those documents to the state court clerk the next morning.

Defendants appealed the remand order to the Fifth Circuit. The Fifth Circuit affirmed, holding: (1) Defendants had waived any objection to the remand procedure by failing to object; (2) the Fifth Circuit lacked jurisdiction to review the clerk's compliance with remand procedures under 28 U.S.C. § 1447(c); and (3) the district court did not abuse its discretion in assessing $7,500 in sanctions.²

B. Recusal

Approximately two-and-a-half hours prior to Longoria's hand-delivery of the remand order to the state court clerk, Defendants filed a motion to recuse Judge Wood. Judge Wood declined to recuse himself and forwarded the motion to Judge Guy Herman, the Presiding Judge of the Statutory Probate Courts. Judge Herman appointed Judge Gladys Burwell to hear the motion and set a hearing date. Prior to the hearing, Defendants' counsel filed a second motion to recuse, this one against Judge Burwell. Defendants' counsel then filed a third recusal motion, this one against Judge Herman. Judge Burwell forwarded the motions to Judge Herman, who reset all pending recusal motions for hearing on January 8, 2007. Defendants did not appear at that hearing.

Judge Herman first dismissed the motion to recuse Judge Burwell because it was filed by the attorney for the Defendants on his own behalf, not by the Defendants themselves, and Texas law requires that motions to recuse be "filed by parties, not by attorneys." Judge Herman then dismissed the motion to recuse himself because it was also filed on behalf of Defendants' counsel, not on behalf of the Defendants. Judge Herman went on to note that the motions improperly invoked Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 18a rather than Texas Government Code section 25.00255, which governs recusal procedure in statutory probate courts. Finally, Judge Herman heard the motion to recuse Judge Wood. Because Defendants did not put on any evidence or argument in support of their motion,-Judge Herman denied the motion and awarded sanctions in the amount of $12,000 for "frivolous plead-ing[s]".

After the recusal hearing, Judge Wood began a bench trial. Again, Defendants did not appear. Judge Wood signed a final judgment for Plaintiffs on January 12, 2007, awarding roughly $205 million in damages.³

C. Appeal

Defendants raised two discrete procedural points, the first governed by federal remand law, the second by state recusal law. Defendants argued the trial-court judgment and sanctions order were void because they were entered (1) before jurisdiction had revested in state court, and (2) while recusal motions were pending.

The court of appeals rejected the first argument but accepted the second.⁴ It held that jurisdiction had revested in Judge Wood's probate court, but his judgment and Judge Herman's sanctions order were nevertheless void given the three pending recusal motions.⁵ The court of appeals relied on its prior interpretation of Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code section 30.01(5 in In re Whatley⁶ and held that the provision for tertiary recusal motions only applies when a third recusal motion has been filed by the same party against "the same judge."⁷ The parties filed cross-petitions for review.

II. Discussion

A. Remand

The revesting-of-jurisdiction question turns on this portion of 28 U.S.C. § 1447(c): "A certified copy of the order of remand shall be mailed by the clerk to the clerk of the State court. The State court may thereupon proceed with such case." Defendants argue that section 1447(c) contemplates mailing and only mailing, so Plaintiffs' hand-delivery did not revest jurisdiction in the probate court but rather circumvented and violated the remand procedures we mandated in Quaestor Investments, Inc. v. State of Chiapas.⁸ We disagree. When determining jurisdiction under section 1447(c), what matters more is what the federal court ordered, not what the federal clerk mailed.

In Quaestor, a state district court granted a default judgment to Quaestor Investments, a Texas corporation, against the State of Chiapas on April 19, 1995.⁹ On October 5, 1995, five months and sixteen days after the default judgment was signed, Chiapas removed the suit.¹⁰ The federal district court remanded the case on December 28, 1995.¹¹ On August 29, 1996, Chiapas filed a petition for writ of error in the court of appeals, ¹² and Quaestor moved to dismiss the petition as untimely, arguing the petition must have been brought within six months of the date of judgment.¹³ The court of appeals overruled Quaestor's motion to dismiss and remanded to the trial court, holding that the appellate timetable recommenced when Quaestor gave notice to Chiapas of remand.¹⁴ Quaestor then filed a petition for review in this Court.

The central question in Quaestor was when the appellate timetable recommenced after remand.¹⁵ We held it recommenced upon the revesting of jurisdiction in state court, which happened "when the federal district court executes the remand order and mails a certified copy to the state court. To the extent that earlier Texas court of appeals cases indicate that jurisdiction revests when the federal court executes the remand order, we disapprove of that language." ¹⁶ Defendants thus claim Quaestor's broad language definitively established that the pivotal event for revesting is the mailing of the remand order by the federal-court clerk to the state-court clerk. Defendants misconstrue our holding.

Importantly, Quaestor did not involve the question presented here: whether jurisdiction revests when an executed remand order is hand-delivered to the state court in lieu of mailing. Today's case raises an alternative delivery method, something we had no occasion to examine in Quaestor. In short, Quaestor simply cannot bear the unduly rigid reading urged by Defendants.

Pressing their argument that hand-delivery of the remand order did not revest jurisdiction in state court, Defendants argue that neither the federal district court nor the state court can be vested with jurisdiction, so the case has become moot. According to Defendants, the federal district court has been divested of...