The Houston Fourteenth Court of Appeals recently issued an opinion that addresses a couple of important issues for supersedeas practice, namely consolidated financial statements, burden of proof, and expert requirements.
In Hunter Buildings & Manufacturing L.P. v. MBI Global L.L.C., the trial court signed a judgment against six entities for joint-and-several liability. Three of
The El Paso Court of Appeals has become the most recent appellate court to weigh in on the issue of whether the judgment that is being appealed should be included on a balance sheet insofar as determining an appellant’s net worth for supersedeas bond purposes.
In Business Staffing Inc. v. Jackson Hot Oil Service, Jackson
The Dallas Court of Appeals has held that a trial court did not abuse its discretion by excluding the amount of the judgment appealed from the judgment debtor’s net worth calculation for purposes of a supersedeas bond. What is different from this opinion than from a prior opinion we blogged about is that in this
Once again, a court of appeals has weighed in on the question of calculating net worth for purposes of supersedeas. The Dallas Court of Appeals recently held that a trial court did not abuse its discretion by refusing to include the judgment as a liability in calculating the judgment debtor’s net worth. The court relied on the
After waiting more than a decade for some guidance from the Texas Supreme Court on the meaning of "net worth" in discovery matters, we thought we were going to get just that–at least until last Friday, that is. In last Friday’s orders, the high court granted the motion to dismiss filed by the real parties in
The Dallas Court of Appeals recently held that a trial court abused its discretion by ordering production of irrelevant net worth information. The Court first acknowledged that "net worth is relevant and discoverable when punitive damages may be awarded." The Court noted the "corollary to that rule is that when punitive damages are not recoverable, information
A few months back, I wrote about a mandamus opinion from the Houston Fourteenth Court of Appeals, involving discovery of net worth. The majority and concurring opinions were groundbreaking in terms of their discussions.
This Spring, I wrote an article that appeared in the Appellate Advocate and discussed discovery of net worth. I noted that the Relators
At least since the Texas Supreme Court’s 1994 opinion in Transportation Insurance Company v. Moriel, questions of the right to discovery of a defendant’s net worth information, the definition of "net worth", and the scope of information relating to net worth have been simmering in the district courts and in the courts of appeals. The latest opinion on the subject has been issued by the Fourteenth District Court of Appeals and the concurring opinion makes case for why it’s time for the Texas Supreme Court to address these thorny issues. The majority’s opinion in In re Jacobs may be found here. The concurring opinion may be found here.Continue Reading Discovery of Net Worth Continues to Simmer