Opinion Library

In the Interest of P.S.R.F., D.M.R.F., D.A.R., P.R.R., B.I.R., B.E.R., B.L.R., and Y.R.R., Children

COA11

The Eleventh Court of Appeals affirmed termination of the mother’s parental rights to eight children after appointed counsel filed an Anders brief and the court independently reviewed the record for any nonfrivolous appellate issue. The court emphasized that the evidence supported endangerment findings under Texas Family Code § 161.001(b)(1)(D) and (E), relying on proof of the mother’s continuing pattern of drug abuse and the resulting danger and instability for the children, which showed a substantial risk of harm and parental incapacity. Because no arguable challenge existed to the predicate grounds or best-interest finding, the court affirmed, but it denied appellate counsel’s motion to withdraw as premature under In re P.M. because appointed counsel’s duties continue through exhaustion of appeals.

Litigation Takeaway

"In termination and custody-related litigation, substance-abuse evidence is most powerful when developed as an ongoing pattern tied directly to child danger, instability, and impaired parenting—not as isolated bad acts. Appellate lawyers should also remember that Anders review in parental-rights cases requires meaningful attention to § 161.001(b)(1)(D) and (E) findings, and appointed counsel usually must stay on the case through the petition-for-review stage."

Child Custody

Jose Luis Espinoza v. The State of Texas

COA13

In Jose Luis Espinoza v. The State of Texas, the Thirteenth Court of Appeals affirmed convictions for continuous sexual abuse of a young child and two indecency-with-a-child counts. The key dispute was whether the State proved the continuous-abuse statute’s thirty-or-more-day duration element when one child could not give precise dates and the defense argued the allegations were too vague and fabricated amid a family feud over the grandmother’s estate and residence. The court applied standard legal-sufficiency review under Jackson v. Virginia and held that exact dates were unnecessary. It focused on whether a rational factfinder could infer repeated abuse over the required span from the testimony. B.H.’s testimony that Espinoza touched her genitals over clothing twenty to thirty times over about a year was enough by itself to satisfy the duration requirement, even though P.P.’s timeline was less precise. The court also rejected Espinoza’s double-jeopardy, outcry, extraneous-act, medical-records, expert-testimony, and cumulative-error complaints, treating the defense’s fabrication and credibility themes as issues for the jury rather than grounds for reversal.

Litigation Takeaway

"For Texas family litigators, Espinoza is a strong crossover case on abuse-proof sufficiency: a child’s inability to give calendar-specific dates does not defeat abuse allegations if the testimony describes repeated conduct over an identifiable span. It is especially useful in custody, modification, protective-order, and termination litigation to counter the argument that abuse claims are too vague to credit. The case also shows that outcry and SANE-related evidence can survive appellate attack when properly framed, and that motive-to-fabricate theories tied to property or inheritance disputes usually create fact issues, not automatic legal wins."

Child Support Enforcement

In re James Robert Lawson, IV

COA03

In In re James Robert Lawson, IV, the Third Court of Appeals held that a Bell County trial court lost jurisdiction to act on a child-support enforcement matter once the obligor filed a notice of removal in federal court and filed that notice in state court under 28 U.S.C. § 1446(d). Even though the enforcement hearing proceeded and the trial court later signed a capias for the father’s arrest, the court of appeals concluded the state court was barred from proceeding at all during the period between removal and remand. Relying on federal removal law and Texas precedent treating post-removal state-court orders as void, the court held the capias and related orders were legal nullities, not merely erroneous rulings. Because the challenged order was void and involved confinement-related process in a child-support enforcement case, habeas relief was proper, and the court conditionally granted relief directing the trial court to vacate the capias and related orders.

Litigation Takeaway

"When a notice of removal is filed in state court, the family court must stop immediately. Any contempt, capias, enforcement, or temporary order signed before remand is vulnerable as void, so practitioners should shift their efforts to federal remand practice rather than asking the state court to proceed anyway."

Appeal and Mandamus

In re Brittany Hilbert

COA05

In In re Brittany Hilbert, a pro se relator sought mandamus relief in a conservatorship-related case, asking the Dallas Court of Appeals to undo post-hearing orders affecting due process, attorney’s fees, and interim conservatorship or possession. The court did not reach those substantive complaints because the petition failed to comply with multiple mandatory requirements of Texas Rule of Appellate Procedure 52, including required sections, a proper certification, an appendix, and a sworn or certified mandamus record. The court also found that the petition and appendix contained unredacted sensitive data in violation of Rule 9.9. Because these procedural defects were dispositive, the court denied mandamus relief and struck the filing without addressing the merits.

Litigation Takeaway

"In emergency family-law appellate practice, procedure can decide the case before the merits ever matter. A mandamus petition must strictly comply with Rule 52, include a proper certified or sworn record, and be fully redacted under Rule 9.9; otherwise even strong due-process or custody arguments may never be heard."

Family Violence & Protective Orders

Brian Alex Bermudez v. The State of Texas

COA14

In Bermudez v. State, the Fourteenth Court of Appeals affirmed a family-violence assault conviction and the denial of a motion for new trial. The defendant argued his lawyer had an actual conflict because counsel had pending criminal charges of his own, that counsel was ineffective for not securing an additional witness to testify the complainant was intoxicated, and that the trial court wrongly excluded the complainant’s testimony after a sequestration violation. The court held the conflict claim failed because the record did not show counsel’s personal charges adversely affected any specific trial decision; in fact, counsel affirmatively pursued intoxication as a central defense theme. The omitted-witness claim also failed because the proposed testimony was cumulative of other evidence showing intoxication and did not address the assault itself. Finally, the court held the trial court acted within its discretion under Rule 614 by excluding the complainant after the defendant discussed another witness’s testimony with her during a jail call, creating a concrete risk of tailored testimony.

Litigation Takeaway

"For family-law litigators, Bermudez is a strong crossover case on three recurring themes: sequestration matters, speculative conflict claims usually fail, and cumulative omitted-witness testimony rarely justifies post-judgment relief. If a witness has been exposed to trial testimony through calls, texts, or hallway updates, the court has broad discretion to exclude that witness to protect the integrity of the proceeding. And if a party attacks counsel based on personal legal troubles, the attack must be tied to a specific adverse effect on representation—not just optics or suspicion."

In the Interest of G.L.M., a Child

COA11

In this parental-rights termination appeal, appointed counsel filed an Anders brief asserting no nonfrivolous issues. The Eleventh Court independently reviewed the record and held the evidence was legally sufficient to support termination under Family Code section 161.001(b)(1)(D) and (E), based on the mother’s pattern of drug and alcohol abuse and the resulting danger to the child, as well as the best-interest finding. The court also held that the trial court improperly relied on former section 161.001(b)(1)(O) because that predicate ground had been repealed by the 2025 amendments and the case was still pending after the amendment’s effective date. Rather than reverse, the court modified the termination order to delete the void subsection (O) finding, affirmed the order as modified, and denied appointed counsel’s motion to withdraw as premature under In re P.M.

Litigation Takeaway

"Two practical lessons stand out: first, family-law lawyers must update pleadings and proposed orders for statutory changes because a repealed predicate ground can become void in a pending case; second, endangerment findings under subsections (D) and (E) remain critically important on appeal because they can sustain termination and carry collateral consequences in future custody litigation. The case also reminds appointed counsel that an Anders affirmance does not automatically end representation in a termination appeal."

In the Interest of A.M., a Child

COA02

The Fort Worth Court of Appeals affirmed termination of Father’s parental rights because Father challenged only one of three predicate grounds under Texas Family Code section 161.001(b)(1)—subsection (N)—while leaving unchallenged the trial court’s findings under subsections (B) and (C), and he also did not challenge the best-interest finding. Applying settled termination law, the court held that one unchallenged predicate ground plus an unchallenged best-interest finding is enough to support affirmance, so reversal was unavailable regardless of Father’s attack on subsection (N). The court also rejected Father’s due-process complaint about alleged statutory and service-plan irregularities because he did not preserve that complaint in the trial court and, on appeal, failed to support it with meaningful authority, analysis, or record citations, resulting in waiver.

Litigation Takeaway

"In any family-law appeal, you must challenge every independent basis supporting the judgment and separately attack best interest when required; otherwise, the appellate court can affirm without reaching your preferred issue. Just as important, procedural and due-process complaints must be raised in the trial court and then fully briefed on appeal with authority and record support."

Kong v. Department of Family and Protective Services

COA10

In Kong v. Department of Family and Protective Services, the Tenth Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s order striking a paternal aunt’s petition in intervention seeking managing conservatorship of two children after the parents’ rights had already been terminated. The aunt filed nearly five months after the final termination order. The court held the filing was untimely for two independent reasons: intervention generally must occur before final judgment, and once the termination order became final and plenary power expired, the closed case could not be reopened by a new intervention unless the judgment had first been set aside; separately, Texas Family Code section 102.006(c) barred a relative’s post-termination conservatorship request filed more than 90 days after termination. The court also rejected any attempt to save the pleading by treating it as an original SAPCR rather than an intervention, because the statutory deadline still controlled. The trial court therefore did not abuse its discretion in striking the aunt’s filing.

Litigation Takeaway

"Deadlines and standing can end a family-law case before best-interest evidence ever matters. If a relative wants conservatorship after termination, counsel must act quickly—preferably before final judgment and, at minimum, within Family Code section 102.006(c)’s 90-day window. Post-judgment relabeling of a pleading will not cure untimeliness once finality and statutory standing barriers attach."

Evidence

Darren Marcel Hanson v. The State of Texas

COA05

In Hanson, the Dallas Court of Appeals affirmed a capital-murder conviction arising from the brutal beating and robbery of an elderly victim. The court held the evidence was legally sufficient because the defendant’s own admissions, the victim’s extreme injuries, the victim’s vulnerability, and the surrounding robbery evidence allowed the jury to infer intent to kill. The court also rejected the defendant’s hearsay challenge to the victim’s identification statements, not on the merits, but because the complaint was not preserved: a pretrial hearsay objection did not suffice when substantially similar evidence later came in without a renewed or running objection. Finally, the court held that a variance between the oral sentence and written judgment did not require remand and instead modified the judgment to correct clerical error before affirming as modified.

Litigation Takeaway

"The family-law crossover lesson is preservation. In abuse-driven custody, protective-order, termination, and divorce trials, a pretrial hearsay objection is not enough if the same statement later comes in through another witness or exhibit without a renewed or expressly running objection. Trial lawyers must preserve evidentiary complaints with precision every time the evidence is offered—or risk waiving a potentially strong appellate issue."

Family Violence & Protective Orders

Tutt v. State

COA02

In Tutt v. State, the Fort Worth Court of Appeals affirmed a domestic-violence conviction after rejecting a hearsay challenge to the complainant’s on-scene statements and a sufficiency challenge to habitual-offender enhancement proof. Officers forced entry after a distress call and scream, then found the complainant frightened, crying, and bearing fresh cuts. The court held that her statements to the responding officer that Tutt had cut her arm and choked her were admissible as excited utterances because the circumstances showed a startling event, close temporal proximity, ongoing stress, and statements directly related to the assault. The court also held that, under the totality of the evidence, the State sufficiently linked Tutt to two prior Missouri felony convictions for enhancement purposes. The judgment was affirmed.

Litigation Takeaway

"For family-law cases involving family violence, on-scene statements to police, 911 narratives, and similar contemporaneous disclosures are far more likely to come in when you can show immediacy, fear, fresh injuries, and little time for reflection. Build or attack the evidentiary mosaic—timing, demeanor, corroborating texts, photos, dispatch records, and officer observations—because those surrounding facts often determine whether violence evidence shapes custody, protective-order, and divorce outcomes."