The judge presiding over Dallas County Court-at-Law No. 1 has been ordered by a panel of justices on the Fifth Court of Appeals to issue a ruling on a long-pending motion to compel arbitration, or it will issue a writ of mandamus.
Judge D’Metria Benson is presiding over a home construction dispute between Alexandra and Charles Martin and Megatel Homes. The couple filed suit in Dallas County in April 2021, according to court documents, and Megatel moved to compel arbitration on June 30, 2022, under the terms of a residential construction contract the parties entered into.
In an opinion dated Nov. 12 but not published to the court’s website until Monday, the panel found that “the trial judge has abused her discretion by failing to perform her ministerial duty to rule on Megatel’s motion to compel arbitration despite Megatel’s numerous attempts to set a hearing and request a ruling.”
Justice Emily Miskell, who authored the court’s 11-page ruling, noted that the court was not expressing any opinion on the merits of the motion to compel arbitration.
“We order the trial judge to set and hold a hearing on Megatel’s motion to compel arbitration no later than thirty days after the date of this court’s opinion and order,” she wrote for the court. “We also order the trial judge to rule on Megatel’s motion to compel arbitration no later than fifteen days after hearing the motion. The writ of mandamus will issue only if the trial judge fails to comply with this Court’s opinion and order.”
According to the opinion, Judge Benson set the first hearing on the motion to compel arbitration for Nov. 2, 2022. Once based on a request from the Martins and once because of inclement weather, the hearing was twice reset, and eventually scheduled for April 5, 2023.
At that hearing, the court heard oral arguments but didn’t rule on the motion, instead instructing the parties to conduct “limited discovery due to disagreement regarding the formation of the contract.”
A fourth hearing was scheduled for July 26, 2023, but discovery hadn’t been completed, so at that hearing, Judge Benson ordered discovery to be completed by Aug. 25, 2023.
The day before a scheduled Dec. 6, 2023, hearing, the court contacted the parties to inform them the hearing wasn’t on the trial judge’s docket and would need to be reset. Megatel unsuccessfully contacted the court multiple times in June, July and August 2024 to try and get a hearing set on the motion to compel.
“Court staff informed Megatel that the trial court had no availability prior to the October 7, 2024, trial setting but that it should continue to call back to see if a hearing date might become available,” the opinion reads. “At this point, on August 6 and again on August 12, the parties filed an agreed motion for continuance of the October 7 jury trial date to allow the trial court to hear Megatel’s still-pending motion to compel arbitration and plea in abatement. The trial judge did not rule on the agreed motion for continuance.”
On Oct. 2, Megatel turned to the Fifth Court of Appeals and filed a petition for writ of mandamus.
“We presume that, prior to this court’s stay of the jury trial, the trial judge intended to rule on the pending motion to compel arbitration and agreed motion for continuance on the trial date,” the panel wrote. “However, this schedule eviscerates much of the time and resource-saving benefits of arbitration, effectively requiring both parties to prepare for a trial that may or may not take place on the same date. In addition, scheduling a jury trial is inconsistent with the statutory requirement that a trial court stay a proceeding if a motion to compel arbitration has been made under the [Texas Arbitration Act].”
Justices Robbie Partida-Kipness, Erin A. Nowell and Emily Miskel sat on the panel.
Megatel is represented by Carl J. Wilkerson, David M. Jones, Jaylon Wesley, Donald Shelton and Tyler Hood of Bush Rudnicki Shelton and Nathan D. Pearman of Hesse & Hesse.
The Martins are represented by Ted B. Lyon, Richard Mann and Aidan Moffatt of Ted B. Lyon & Associates.
Judge Benson did not retain counsel.
The case number is 05-24-01161-CV.