Reply #19: TX Rules of Civil and Appellate Procedure and Code of Judicial Conduct are issued by the TX SCT

[Baltasar D. Cruz]

Thank you for your question.

All of the Texas Rules of Civil and Appellate Procedure, the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct and the Texas Pattern Jury Charges are issued and periodically amended by the Texas Supreme Court. Therefore, it is up to the Texas Supreme Court to implement the changes I support. My opponent in the Democratic primary, Mr. Houston, has said (at a meeting with a panel from the Dallas Morning News editorial board at which I was present) that he does not support making any changes to the Texas Rules of Civil procedure because he does not believe in rule making. To me this is a bizarre comment because these rules have been enacted, and are periodically amended, by the Texas Supreme Court. I then asked Mr. Houston if he favored abolishing the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure and the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct (since he does not believe in rule making by the Texas Supreme Court), to which he responded that he does not favor abolishing them.

For example, Rule 173 of the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, which defines the role of guardians ad litem who are appointed in civil cases for children and mentally incompetent persons, was amended by the Texas Supreme Court in 2004 in order to limit the role that a guardian ad litem can play in protecting the interests of minors and incompetent persons in the Texas Courts. This was done as a favor to insurance companies who do not like paying out more money when a guardian ad litem (a role to which I have been appointed in 11 cases) rejects a proposed settlement and intervenes in a case to obtain a much better result for the child or incompetent person in question, as I have done on several occassions. For example, in one case (prior to the 2004 changes) I rejected a proposed settlement of $67,500 for an injured child, obtained a neuropsychological evaluation for the child (which showed that he had a traumatic brain injury), fired an incompetent Plaintiff's attorney who had filed documents with the Court which could have been used against the child (asserting that I had found nothing wrong with the child), hired another attorney to take over the case, rejected another settlement offer of $140,000.00 and ultimately negotiated and approved a settlement of $215,000.00 plus $35,000.00 in court costs. Under the current rules, it is difficult to imagine how such a result could be obtained under similar circumstances. This is also a good example of why I want to expand the authority of a guardian ad litem under Rule 173 and Mr. Houston, who is primarily an insurance defense attorney and has never served as a guardian ad litem for an injured child, does not.

Very sincerely,
Baltasar D. Cruz
Democratic Candidate for Justice
on the Texas Supreme Court (Place 7)
http://cruzforjudge.blogspot.com/