Dallas County has asked the Texas Supreme Court to declare the newly-created Fifteenth Court of Appeals unconstitutional in a bid to prevent its lawsuit against the Texas Health and Human Services Commission — currently pending with the Austin Court of Appeals — from being transferred Sept. 1 when the new court goes live.
In a petition for a writ of injunction filed with the state’s high court Wednesday afternoon, Dallas County alleges numerous ways the structure of the new court violates the state’s constitution. In June, the Legislature passed and the governor signed into law S.B. 1045, which created the Fifteenth Court of Appeals and granted it exclusive, statewide jurisdiction over certain cases involving the state or state officials. The jurisdiction of the state’s other 14 intermediate appellate courts is tethered to the district and county courts within its geographic region, which Dallas County argues is constitutionally required.
“The court should declare S.B. 1045 unconstitutional and enjoin it in its entirety,” Dallas County told the court. “Because the invalid aspects of S.B. 1045 are ‘essentially and inseparably connected in substance’ to whatever remains, and the remaining portions cannot stand on their own, the entire Act should be enjoined.”
In the underlying case, Dallas County accuses the HHS of failing to comply with obligations to transfer inmates who have been determined not competent to stand trial or not guilty by reason of insanity from the county jail to state hospitals.
“The court should issue the writ of injunction to the Third Court of Appeals to prevent the transfer for relator’s appeal to the Fifteenth Court of Appeals,” Dallas County said in the petition. “Briefing is still ongoing, and it is extraordinarily unlikely the court will schedule argument, let alone decide the appeal, before the September 1, 2024, date upon which transfer to the Fifteenth Court of Appeals will occur. Moreover, judicial economy and order are best served by this court reviewing the constitutionality of S.B. 1045 now — prior to September 1, 2024 — to avoid chaos and confusion that could otherwise result from the court’s disposition on the question.”
Notably, the Texas Supreme Court’s current term will come to an end at the end of June.
Counsel for Dallas County, Chad W. Dunn and K. Scott Brazil of Brazil & Dunn, did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment Thursday afternoon.
According to the petition, Dallas County filed its lawsuit against HHS in Travis County District Court in March 2023. Travis County District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble rejected the state’s request to toss the suit on jurisdictional grounds in December 2023. Texas appealed to the Third Court of Appeals in Austin the following month.
The appeal is currently pending there, and briefing is “ongoing,” according to the petition. The state filed a docketing statement with the court of appeals indicating its belief that on Sept. 1 the case will be transferred to the Fifteenth Court of Appeals because it involves a claim against state officials.
Dallas County argues that S.B. 1045 specifically violates Article V, Section 6 of the state constitution that requires courts of appeals be “divided” into “districts.” The county argued the plain meaning of both “divide” and “district” remain the same today as when the state’s constitution was adopted.
“Even the Legislature thought it could not ‘divide’ the state into a statewide Court of Appeals ‘district,”’ Dallas County argued. “In Section 1.01 of S.B. 1045, the Legislature remarkably struck the word “divided” from the relevant statute, Tex. Gov’t. Code § 22.201(a), and replaced it with ‘organized.’”
S.B. 1045 also unconstitutionally deprives the other 14 intermediate appellate courts of their “constitutionally conferred jurisdiction and transfers it to another out-of-district Court of Appeals,” Dallas County told the court.
“The jurisdiction of courts expressly granted to them in the Constitution cannot be by legislation transferred to some other court, because ‘[n]o provision of the Constitution anywhere intimates such a withdrawal or negation of jurisdiction.’”
In a footnote in the petition, Dallas County explained that while it styled its petition to the court as one seeking a writ of injunction, it asked that if the Court “believes some other writ or request for relief more appropriately applies” to construe its petition as seeking such relief.
Dallas County is also represented by E. Leon Carter and Ana Jordan of Carter Arnett.
HHSC is represented by Allison M. Collins and William Wassdorf of the Texas attorney general’s office.
The case number is 24-0426.