Dallas trial lawyer Brian Hail has successfully represented more than two-dozen clients in business disputes that resulted in multimillion-dollar trial victories.
A director at the Dallas-based corporate law firm Kane Russell Coleman Logan, Hail has battled the likes of Shell Oil, Chicago Title, Roche Pharmaceuticals and other large corporations in high-dollar complex litigation.
On Tuesday, he filed a lawsuit closer to home. No monetary damages are being sought. His client is far from being a fat cat who can pay high hourly legal rates. And unlike many of his other cases, he is not accusing his opponents of fraud or willful malfeasance or corruption.
In fact, Hail doesn’t question the motivations of his opposition – he merely wants them to follow Texas law.
On Tuesday, Hail and Texas juvenile law expert Frank Adler filed a lawsuit asking a judge to issue an order killing a subpoena issued by Dallas County Commissioners earlier this month demanding thousands and thousands of confidential records, which are known as “observation sheets,” for 200 children who were held by the Dallas County Juvenile Department during the first four months of 2023.
The Dallas County Commission, which has been investigating claims that children wait longer in juvenile detention to have their cases processed than other counties and that some children are held in solitary confinement, issued a subpoena earlier this month demanding that the documents be produced.
The subpoena, issued by Dallas County on May 11, gave juvenile probation officials 19 days to comply or face fines or possible jail time.
On Tuesday, juvenile probation officials publicly fired back. The state agency hired Hail and Adler to file a lawsuit seeking a court ruling that the commission’s subpoena violates Texas law.
Hail and Adler say the Dallas County commission’s subpoena is “overly broad, unduly burdensome, expensive to comply with and harassing.”
“Any inadvertent disclosure of personally identifiable information for a juvenile could have life-long repercussions for that individual, especially in situations where violence and suicide watch are documented,” the petition states. “Further, any improper disclosure could result in violation of state law.”
In the 15-page complaint filed in Dallas District Court, Hail and Adler point out that Dallas County Commissioner Andy Sommerman initially requested the records on April 28, but that Juvenile District Judge Cheryl Shannon, who serves as the chair of the Juvenile Board, denied his request stating the records being sought are confidential under Texas law.
The petition states that Dallas commissioners “have neither the right to request nor the right to view the records they seek via subpoena.”
“These observation sheets record the status of each youth in custody at differing intervals, some as often as random intervals not to exceed 10 minutes,” the lawsuit states. “Based on the time period in question, the DCJD estimates that the commissioners court’s subpoena seeks production of approximately 90,000 observation sheets, all containing sensitive personally identifiable information, as well as controversial activities ranging from violence to suicide watch.”
Hail and Adler argue that the subpoena requires juvenile department director Darryl Beatty “to break the law and to violate his code of ethics as a State of Texas Certified Juvenile Probation Officer for over 28 years.”
Efforts to obtain a comment from Dallas County had been unsuccessful on Tuesday.