Opinion Library
Texas court rulings translated into actionable litigation strategy.
This Week's DigestStrategy Category
1229 opinions found
In the Interest of Z.D., a Child
COA11
The Eleventh Court of Appeals affirmed termination of the mother’s parental rights after appointed appellate counsel filed an Anders brief stating there were no nonfrivolous issues for appeal. The court first analyzed whether counsel complied with Anders, In re Schulman, and Kelly by thoroughly reviewing the record, serving the mother with the brief and motion to withdraw, and advising her of her right to review the record and file a pro se response. After conducting its own independent review, the court found no arguable ground for reversal, including no viable challenge to the trial court’s endangerment findings under Texas Family Code section 161.001(b)(1)(D) and (E), where the record showed a pattern of drug abuse creating substantial risk of harm to the child and impairing the mother’s ability to parent. The court also held that counsel’s motion to withdraw was premature because appointed counsel in termination appeals generally must continue representation through exhaustion of further appellate remedies under Family Code section 107.016(2) and In re P.M.
Litigation Takeaway
"In termination cases, Anders review will not save a weak record challenge where the evidence clearly ties a parent’s substance abuse to danger, instability, and inability to safely parent. For trial lawyers, the lesson is to build a record that specifically connects conduct to child endangerment and best interest; for appointed appellate counsel, the lesson is to strictly follow Anders procedures and expect representation to continue beyond the court of appeals unless properly relieved."
Fair v. Powell
COA03
In Fair v. Powell, the Austin Court of Appeals rejected a claimed implied easement by necessity across neighboring property in a family land dispute. Fair argued her guesthouse and event-center tract needed access over the Powells’ driveway, but the court focused on Texas’s strict-necessity standard and the time-of-severance requirement. Relying on deed history, recorded instruments, and affidavit testimony showing Fair’s property already had access to Keeneland Drive by a road on her own land, the court held the tract was not landlocked. Because an easement by necessity cannot arise from convenience, lower cost, or longstanding permissive family use, and because alternate access existed, no implied easement by necessity was established.
Litigation Takeaway
"If your client claims a right to keep using a family roadway, driveway, or gate after divorce, partition, or sale, historical practice alone is not enough. Courts will demand objective proof—deeds, surveys, severance history, and actual access to a public road—and any alternate route, even if unpaved or less desirable, can defeat an implied-easement-by-necessity claim."
In the Interest of H.P. Jr. and H.P. III, Children
COA14
The Fourteenth Court of Appeals affirmed termination of both parents’ rights under Family Code section 161.001(b)(1)(E) and (b)(2). The court viewed the evidence cumulatively, not incident by incident, and held that the parents’ repeated domestic violence, incarceration, criminal conduct, instability, missed medical care for the children, substance-abuse and mental-health concerns, failure to complete services, and inability to provide safe care showed a voluntary, deliberate, and conscious course of conduct that endangered the children. The same evidence, along with the children’s improvement in foster care, supported the best-interest finding.
Litigation Takeaway
"Texas courts can infer endangerment and best interest from a parent’s overall pattern of violence, criminality, instability, untreated substance-abuse or mental-health issues, missed medical care, and service-plan noncompliance. In family cases, a party who wants to prove or defeat risk-based restrictions should build or attack the full course-of-conduct narrative, not just isolated events."
In the Interest of A.R.B., a Child
COA13
In *In the Interest of A.R.B., a Child*, the mother challenged only one part of the termination judgment: whether the trial court used the correct version of Texas Family Code § 161.001(b)(1)(O). The suit was filed in 2023, but the Legislature amended § 161.001 effective September 1, 2025, repealing the old service-plan ground in subsection (O) and renumbering the substance-abuse ground into subsection (O). The Thirteenth Court focused on the amendment’s express transition clause, which made the new law apply to SAPCRs pending in the trial court on the effective date. Because this case was still pending on September 1, 2025 and was tried afterward, the amended statute controlled. The court held the trial court correctly applied amended subsection (O) and affirmed the termination order.
Litigation Takeaway
"When a family case stays pending across a legislative change, do not assume the filing date controls. Always check the session law’s effective-date and transition provisions, because amended Family Code sections can apply to pending SAPCRs and change pleadings, proof, jury charge, judgment language, and appellate strategy."
In the Interest of K.M.N., P.N. III, E.J.N., I.A.N., B.L.N., C.A.N., S.V.N., L.F.N., and S.N., Children
COA01
The First Court of Appeals affirmed termination of both parents’ rights after concluding the evidence was legally and factually sufficient to support the trial court’s best-interest finding. The court relied on extensive evidence of danger and instability, including Mother’s cocaine use at the birth of the youngest child, unsafe and unsanitary housing, educational neglect, parentification of older siblings, Father’s sexual-abuse conviction and history of physical abuse, and Mother’s prolonged failure to protect the children despite knowing of Father’s violence and alleged killing of one child. Applying the Family Code best-interest framework and Holley factors, the court held the trial court could reasonably form a firm belief that termination was in the children’s best interest, and it separately affirmed Father’s termination after independent Anders review revealed no non-frivolous appellate issue.
Litigation Takeaway
"In Texas family-law cases, failure to protect can be just as powerful as direct abuse. A parent who continues to align with a known abuser, minimizes danger, or cannot show a real safety plan risks losing conservatorship or parental rights even if that parent was not the primary perpetrator."
Bouvier v. Thompson
COA02
In Bouvier v. Thompson, the plaintiff sued family members in 2024 claiming they concealed inheritance information, committed fraud, breached fiduciary duties, and conspired to deprive her of assets she said she should have inherited. The Fort Worth Court of Appeals affirmed summary judgment because the defendant used the plaintiff’s own prior filings to show she knew the key facts no later than 2014: she believed Ezelle was her biological mother, believed an inheritance was owed to her, and believed family members were concealing it. Applying Texas’s four-year limitations periods for fraud and breach of fiduciary duty, and the derivative limitations rule for conspiracy, the court held the claims accrued by 2014 and were therefore time-barred when filed in 2024. The court also emphasized that arguments about delayed discovery or concealment do not defeat summary judgment without competent evidence.
Litigation Takeaway
"Labels do not save stale claims. If a client’s earlier pleadings, letters, or filings show they already knew the essential facts, Texas limitations likely starts running then—even if they later say they lacked full proof. In family-related property, probate-overlap, and fraud cases, lawyers should audit prior statements carefully, plead only recognized causes of action, and support any tolling theory with actual summary-judgment evidence."
Spragins v. Lunn 34 Cattle
COA02
In Spragins v. Lunn 34 Cattle, the Fort Worth Court of Appeals looked past the trial court’s label of a “restraining order” and held that the order was actually a temporary injunction because it was entered after a contested evidentiary hearing and remained in effect “until further order” during the pendency of the case. Applying Texas Rules of Civil Procedure 683 and 684, the court held the order was void because it did not affirmatively set the case for trial on the merits and did not fix a bond. The court rejected the idea that an “until further order” clause could satisfy Rule 683 and dissolved the injunction.
Litigation Takeaway
"In family-law cases, the label on an order does not control—its function does. If an order entered after notice and hearing operates like a temporary injunction, it must strictly comply with Rules 683 and 684 by including a merits trial setting and a bond amount. Otherwise, the order may be void and vulnerable to immediate interlocutory attack."
In the Matter of the Marriage of Sini Ann Mathews and Wesley Mon Mathews
COA13
In this divorce case, the appellant tried to use a restricted appeal to challenge the final divorce decree after already filing a timely motion for new trial. The Thirteenth Court of Appeals held that a restricted appeal is available only if the appellant did not timely file any post-judgment motion, and that requirement is jurisdictional under the appellate rules and Ex parte E.H. Because the motion for new trial was filed within thirty days of the decree, the appellant could not satisfy a required element of restricted appeal. The court dismissed the appeal for want of jurisdiction and held that later efforts to obtain the appellate record could not cure the defect.
Litigation Takeaway
"Choose your post-judgment remedy carefully. In Texas family cases, a timely motion for new trial and a restricted appeal are not interchangeable fallback options—filing the motion for new trial destroys restricted-appeal jurisdiction."
Armstrong v. Thomas
COA03
In Armstrong v. Thomas, the Austin Court of Appeals held that a same-day handwritten post-divorce side agreement allegedly giving one ex-spouse the right to buy the other’s house could not be enforced against the parties’ divorce paperwork. The agreement incident to divorce and final decree confirmed the property as the husband’s property, included present-tense conveyancing and quitclaim language, and the AID contained a merger clause stating it was the parties’ entire agreement. The court analyzed the dispute primarily through quiet-title and statute-of-frauds principles, concluding that the handwritten note lacked the essential terms required for an enforceable real-estate sale and that oral testimony and later conduct could not supply those missing terms. The court also held that findings of fact and conclusions of law are improper after summary judgment and that the wife’s nonsuit did not eliminate the husband’s pending counterclaims for affirmative relief. The summary judgment declaring the side agreement unenforceable and quieting title in the husband was affirmed.
Litigation Takeaway
"If a divorce-related real estate deal matters, put every material term in the decree package or referenced closing documents. A vague side agreement, even one signed the same day as the divorce papers, may be wiped out by merger language, quitclaim language, and the statute of frauds. For litigators, Armstrong is a strong early-summary-judgment case for attacking post-divorce property claims based on informal side deals."
In the Interest of M.T., a Child
COA10
The Waco Court of Appeals affirmed a judgment terminating the mother’s parental rights after appointed appellate counsel filed an Anders brief stating there were no non-frivolous issues to raise. The court reviewed whether Anders procedures apply in termination cases, whether counsel’s brief provided the required professional evaluation of the record, and whether the court’s own independent review revealed any arguable appellate issue. After confirming counsel addressed potential jurisdictional and evidentiary-sufficiency issues, including predicate grounds under Texas Family Code section 161.001(b)(1)(D) and (E) and best interest under section 161.001(b)(2), and after finding the mother’s pro se response identified no legal error, the court held the appeal was frivolous, affirmed the termination order, and dismissed the mother’s emergency motion for temporary relief as moot.
Litigation Takeaway
"In family appeals, especially termination cases, appellate success depends on a preserved and legally developed trial record. If no concrete, non-frivolous issue was preserved below, appointed counsel may proceed under Anders, and a general plea for reversal will not substitute for an actual legal complaint."