Bekins Moving & Storage Co. v. Williams

947 S.W.2d 568, 1997 Tex. App. LEXIS 2779, 1997 WL 205364
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedMay 28, 1997
Docket06-96-00041-CV
StatusPublished
Cited by47 cases

This text of 947 S.W.2d 568 (Bekins Moving & Storage Co. v. Williams) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bekins Moving & Storage Co. v. Williams, 947 S.W.2d 568, 1997 Tex. App. LEXIS 2779, 1997 WL 205364 (Tex. Ct. App. 1997).

Opinions

OPINION

CORNELIUS, Chief Justice.

Bekins Moving & Storage appeals from a judgment awarding Jean Williams damages for mental anguish and damage to her property arising out of Bekins’ moving services.

Bekins raises twenty-seven points of error. Williams raises three cross-points. In summary, Bekins contends that the judgment should be reversed because limitations barred Williams’ suit; Williams’ recovery for negligence is improper because she could recover only in contract; she could not recover in contract because she never paid the moving bill; she cannot recover under the Insurance Code because Bekins is not an insurer; and there is insufficient evidence to support her recovery under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act.

Bekins also contends that the award of treble damages is improper, that Williams received a double recovery, and that the trial court erred by refusing to provide Bekins with sufficient time to review the jury charge.

In June of 1991, Jean Williams hired Be-kins to move her household belongings from Dallas to her new home in Quitman. Bekins subcontracted the actual moving of her property, which included an antique square piano and a large amount of china, crystal, and other fragile items, to Melvin & Benny’s Movers, a smaller local mover. The movers dropped, broke, cracked, and otherwise damaged various pieces of Williams’ property. She tried to get Bekins to pay for the damage, but was unsuccessful. Bekins did make an offer to settle that was substantially below her claim, and she refused to accept. She eventually filed suit against Bekins in a county court at law in Dallas County. Her suit was dismissed for lack of jurisdiction when she filed an amended petition alleging damages above the statutory limits of the court. Three days before the county court at law dismissed her suit, Williams filed a like suit in district court in Wood County.

Trial was to a jury, which returned a verdict favorable to Williams on all her claims except fraud. The jury also failed to find that Bekins’ deceptive trade practices were knowingly committed.

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Williams elected to recover on the basis of the Insurance Code violations under Sections 21.21 and 21.55 and for negligence. The total recovery was thus $187,897.56, plus attorney’s fees in the amount of $35,000.00 plus $10,000.00 on appeal, and costs of court in the amount of $1,949.85, all to bear interest at ten percent from January 4, 1996, until paid.

Bekins first contends that this action is barred by limitations and that the trial court should have allowed it to amend its petition on the morning trial was to begin to add limitations as an affirmative defense, or should have ruled in its favor on a “special exception” filed at that time.

Parties may amend their pleadings within seven days of the date of trial or thereafter with leave of court. Leave shall be granted unless there is a showing that the amendment will operate as a surprise to the opposite party. Tex.R.Civ.P. 63. The trial court has discretion to refuse an amendment if the opposing party presents evidence of surprise or prejudice, or if the amendment asserts a new cause of action or defense and the opposing party objects to the amendment. See Greenhalgh v. Service Lloyds Ins. Co., 787 S.W.2d 938, 939 (Tex.1990).

Bekins’ trial amendment asserted a new defense: the statute of limitations. When an amendment introducing new substantive matter has been refused by the trial court under Rule 63, the burden of showing an abuse of discretion is on the complaining party. Hardin v. Hardin, 597 S.W.2d 347, 349 (Tex.1980). On appeal, the trial court’s ruling will not be disturbed unless the complaining party clearly shows an abuse of discretion. Hardin v. Hardin, 597 S.W.2d at 350; Coble Wall Trust Co. v. Palmer, 848 S.W.2d 696, 706 (Tex.App.-San Antonio 1991), rev’d on other grounds, 851 S.W.2d 178 (Tex. 1992). Williams’ suit had been pending for some two years when Bekins attempted to raise limitations for the first time on the day testimony was to begin. Ordinarily that would operate to the prejudice of the other party.

Bekins argues that because Williams had alleged fraud theories, and only abandoned them shortly before trial, it had no duty to plead limitations as a defense until those theories were dropped from the case, because the fraud theories were not barred. That circumstance, however, did not excuse Bekins’ failure to file a limitations plea to Williams’ other theories of recovery. We conclude that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by denying Bekins’ motion to add an affirmative defense of limitations on the morning of trial, when the case had been pending in that court for two years.

The limitations defense would not have prevailed even if it had been timely raised. This suit was first filed in a county court at law in Dallas County. That court dismissed the case after Williams amended her pleadings to seek damages beyond the jurisdiction of that court. Three days before that case was dismissed, Williams filed a like suit in the 114th District Court in Wood County.

The suit was timely filed in the Dallas County court at law. That filing suspended the running of limitations between its filing and the date of a second filing of the same action in a different court if (1) the action was dismissed because of lack of jurisdiction in the initial court and (2) not later than the sixtieth day after the date the dismissal or other disposition became final, the action was commenced in a court of proper jurisdiction. Tex.Civ.PRAc. & Rem.Code Ann. § 16.064(a) (Vernon 1986).

Bekins contends that we should not consider the history of the case as outlined [575]*575because it is not shown by the documents filed of record in the first case. As a result, Williams has filed a motion asking this court to take judicial notice of records of the county court at law that reflect the initial filing.

To be the proper subject of judicial notice, a fact must be capable of accurate and ready determination by resort to sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned. Further, taking judicial notice is mandatory if “requested by a party and [the court is] supplied with the necessary information.” Tex.R.Civ.Evid. 201(d); Office of Pub. Util. Counsel v. Public Util. Comm’n, 878 S.W.2d 598, 600 (Tex.1994). In this case, Williams has asked this court to take judicial notice of the records of a case in a court below. They have been provided for review. To take judicial notice of those records in this situation is proper. Accordingly, we have complete information before us to reflect the earlier filing of the suit in Dallas County.

Bekins contends that, because the second filing occurred three days before the dismissal of the first ease, Article 16.064(a) does not apply. We do not agree. The language of the statute is clear, and we do not believe it requires that the first case be dismissed before the case is filed in the second court. It merely provides a date by which the second filing must occur.

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Bluebook (online)
947 S.W.2d 568, 1997 Tex. App. LEXIS 2779, 1997 WL 205364, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bekins-moving-storage-co-v-williams-texapp-1997.