Nuby v. Allied Bankers Life Insurance Co.

797 S.W.2d 396, 1990 WL 150183
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedOctober 10, 1990
Docket3-89-174-CV
StatusPublished
Cited by26 cases

This text of 797 S.W.2d 396 (Nuby v. Allied Bankers Life Insurance Co.) 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
Nuby v. Allied Bankers Life Insurance Co., 797 S.W.2d 396, 1990 WL 150183 (Tex. Ct. App. 1990).

Opinion

PER CURIAM.

This appeal concerns the failure of appellants to file a timely statement of points to be relied on when they requested a partial statement of facts.

Randy S. Nuby and Lone Star Housing, Inc. sued Allied Bankers Life Insurance Company and Commodore Life Insurance Company separately for breach of contract for failure to pay full commissions for the sale of credit life insurance. After consolidation of the actions against Allied and Commodore, Nuby and Lone Star amended their petition to allege a civil conspiracy between Allied and Commodore. Allied and Commodore counterclaimed against Nuby and Lone Star for failure to return unearned insurance commissions. The district court rendered judgment based on a jury verdict for Allied and Commodore on their counterclaim. We deny Nuby and Lone Star’s postsubmission request to supplement the statement of facts, deny Commodore’s request for damages, and affirm the judgment of the district court.

This action arose out of the sale of credit life insurance in conjunction with the purchase and financing of mobile homes. Lone Star and Nuby, a principal shareholder of Lone Star, were in the business of mobile home retail sales. As a part of this business, Lone Star financed the mobile home sales and sold most of the retail financing agreements to third party lenders. Nuby, as agent for various insurance companies including Commodore and Allied, sold credit life insurance to insure payment of the outstanding balance of the purchase price of the mobile homes in the event of the purchaser’s death. Nuby assigned all of his commissions on credit- life insurance sales to Lone Star.

Nuby and Lone Star maintain that they were entitled to a forty-five percent commission on insurance sales from Commodore and its successor, Allied, instead of the twenty-five percent commission that was actually paid. Nuby and Lone Star also claim that Nuby was entitled to receive the unearned premiums Allied refunded to the lender which ultimately provided financing for the mobile homes. 1 That lender was Commodore Financial Corporation, which has since assigned its financing agreements to Oxford Financial Corporation. Allied and Commodore counterclaimed against Nuby and Lone Star for unearned commissions.

Nuby and Lone Star appeal with fourteen points of error. Point of error one is directed at the district court’s alleged error in overruling Nuby and Lone Star’s motion for summary judgment. We overrule point of error one because we cannot review a trial court’s action in overruling a motion for summary judgment in a case when a final judgment has been rendered after a trial on the merits. Ackermann v. Vordenbaum, 403 S.W.2d 362, 365 (Tex.1966); In re Renteria, 624 S.W.2d 353, 354 (Tex.App.1981, no writ).

Points of error two through thirteen all allege that Nuby and Lone Star were entitled to judgment as a matter of law, or in the alternative, that the evidence is factually insufficient. In addition, point of error fourteen alleges that the district court erred in granting judgment for Allied and Commodore because: (1) Allied and Commodore had no duty to refund Nuby’s unearned commissions to Commodore Financial or Oxford; (2) Nuby and Lone Star had no duty to indemnify Allied or Commodore for unearned commissions that Allied and Commodore refunded to Commodore *398 Financial or Oxford; and (3) there was no basis for the district court to find Nuby and Lone Star jointly and severally liable for Nuby’s alleged failure to refund the unearned commissions. Nuby and Lone Star cannot prevail on these points, however, because they requested a partial statement of facts and failed to file a timely statement of points to be relied on as required by Rule 53(d). Tex.R.App.P.Ann. 53(d) (Supp.1990).

Rule 53(d) states that if a statement of points to be relied on is filed, “there shall be a presumption on appeal that nothing omitted from the record is relevant to any of the points specified or to the disposition of the appeal.” The supreme court has recently held that a court of appeals cannot properly find reversible error when the court does not have a complete record of the case before it and the appellant has not complied with Rule 53(d). Christiansen v. Prezelski, 782 S.W.2d 842, 842 (Tex.1990). From the record before us, Nuby and Lone Star have failed to comply with Rule 53(d) by not timely filing a statement of points to be relied on.

The transcript shows that Nuby and Lone Star served their “Request for Preparation of Statement of Facts and Designation of Matter to be Included and Omitted” on July 18, 1989, and that the request was filed on July 19, 1989. Commodore filed a response on July 31, 1989, pointing out Nuby and Lone Star’s failure to file a statement of points, and Allied filed a similar response on August 2, 1989. The district court’s docket sheet shows that a “Statement of Points to be Relied Upon for Appeal” was filed on August 4, 1989, but this statement of points is not in the transcript and, thus, not a part of the record before this court.

We cannot consider items that are not a part of the record on appeal. Gowan v. Reimers, 220 S.W.2d 331, 336 (Tex.Civ.App.1949, writ ref'd n.r.e.); see Tex.R.App. P.Ann. 50(a) (Supp.1990). In their postsub-mission brief Nuby and Lone Star state that they do not understand why the statement of points was not included in the transcript since Rule 51(a) requires the clerk of the trial court to include any notice of limitation of appeal in the transcript. Tex.R.App.P.Ann. 51(a) (Supp.1990). This argument lacks merit as Rule 51(a) by its own terms refers to “any notice of limitation of appeal in civil cases made pursuant to Rule 40.” (Emphasis added.) This case does not involve a limitation of appeal pursuant to Rule 40. Nuby and Lone Star also claim that they were not aware that the statement of points was not included in the transcript until this issue was briefed post-submission at the request of the court. However, Commodore raised the issue of Nuby and Lone Star’s failure to include the statement of points in the transcript six months earlier in its reply brief. Nuby and Lone Star had notice from their opponents over five months before oral submission that a crucial document was not in the record and they failed to request that the record be amended by any of the methods described in Rule 55(b). Tex.R.App.P.Ann. 55(b) (Supp.1990).

Nuby and Lone Star request in their postsubmission brief that this court exercise its power under Rule 55(c) to allow a supplemental transcript to be prepared. 2 We deny this request for two reasons. First, although the rules do give the court discretion to allow supplementation of the record after submission, such discretion should not be exercised absent unusual circumstances. Jackson v. S.P. Leasing Corp., 774 S.W.2d 673, 677 (Tex.App.1989, writ denied); Elkins v. Auto Recovery Bureau,

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Bluebook (online)
797 S.W.2d 396, 1990 WL 150183, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/nuby-v-allied-bankers-life-insurance-co-texapp-1990.