Ramos v. Texas Department of Public Safety

35 S.W.3d 723, 2000 Tex. App. LEXIS 8049, 2000 WL 1752898
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedNovember 30, 2000
Docket01-98-01431-CV
StatusPublished
Cited by46 cases

This text of 35 S.W.3d 723 (Ramos v. Texas Department of Public Safety) 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
Ramos v. Texas Department of Public Safety, 35 S.W.3d 723, 2000 Tex. App. LEXIS 8049, 2000 WL 1752898 (Tex. Ct. App. 2000).

Opinions

OPINION

SAM NUCHIA, Justice.

In this wrongful death case, plaintiffs and intervenors (collectively “appellants”) bring an appeal from an order granting a plea to the jurisdiction in favor of the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) and from a summary judgment rendered in favor of Officer Willie Kent. We affirm.

I. Case Background

On May 15, 1996, Silvia Irachete took Aurora Cano to the DPS’s West Orem Street office in Houston so that Cano could take a road test to obtain a driver’s license. Accompanying Irachete and Cano to the DPS building were six children-five-year-old David Ramos and Melissa Garcia (the decedents), plus four other children.

Officer Kent administered Cano’s road test. While Cano took the test in Ira-chete’s car, Irachete and the six children waited outside, in front of the DPS building. Cano drove the car; Officer Kent rode in the front passenger seat. As Cano completed the road test, she entered the DPS parking lot and pulled into a space in front of the DPS building to park the ear. As she adjusted the car’s position, she stepped on the accelerator instead of the [726]*726brake, causing the car to lurch forward and kill David and Melissa.

David Ramos’s parents, Marisela Ramos and Neyr Ramos, filed this suit against DPS and Officer Kent under the Texas Tort Claims Act1 (the Act). Melissa Garcia’s parents, Maria Suarez Garcia and Sa-lustiano Garcia, later intervened in the lawsuit. The Ramos and Garcia families essentially complain that David’s and Melissa’s deaths were caused by: (1) Officer Kent’s negligent operation and use of Ira-chete’s car; (2) the dangerous condition of the DPS office; and (3) DPS’s failure to warn or protect David and Melissa from the unsafe conditions at the DPS office.

Defendants, both individually and jointly, repeatedly sought to dismiss all claims by filing a series of motions, some of which overlapped. Ultimately, the trial court dismissed all claims against Officer Kent by granting his motion for summary judgment, in which he asserted qualified immunity, as well as dismissing all claims against DPS pursuant to its amended plea to the jurisdiction, in which it asserted sovereign immunity from suit. In four main issues, appellants claim the trial court erred in dismissing all claims.

II. Claims Against Officer Kent and DPS

In issue two, appellants complain the trial court erred in granting Officer Kent’s motion for summary judgment in which Officer Kent asserted the claims against him must be dismissed under the affirmative defense of official immunity. Additionally, appellants assert that because Kent is not entitled to official immunity, DPS is not entitled to immunity vicariously, and therefore its plea to jurisdiction should not have been granted on that basis. DPS had rightly asserted as a ground in its plea to jurisdiction that, if Officer Kent established the defense of official immunity, then no liability could attach to DPS, Kent’s employer, with regard to the claim involving the operation of the motor vehicle. See DeWitt v. Harris County, 904 S.W.2d 650 (Tex.1995).

A. Overview of Official Immunity

The official immunity doctrine protects government employees from civil liability for conduct that would otherwise be actionable. City of Lancaster v. Chambers, 883 S.W.2d 650, 653 (Tex.1994); see also Tex.Civ.Prac. & Rem.Code Ann. § 101.026 (Vernon 1997). Official immunity is based on sound public policy that encourages public officers to perform their discretionary duties without fear of personal liability for negligent or improper performance. Chapman v. Gonzales, 824 S.W.2d 685, 687 (Tex.App. — Houston [14th Dist.] 1992, writ denied). Official immunity protects the government officer from individual liability for the performance of his duties if three requirements are met: (1) the duties must have been discretionary duties, rather than ministerial duties; (2) the employee must have acted in good faith when he exercised his duties; and (3) the employee must have acted within the course and scope of his authority. Chambers, 883 S.W.2d at 653; Korndorffer v. Baker, 976 S.W.2d 696, 701 (Tex.App.— Houston [1st Dist.] 1997, pet. dism’d w.o.j.).

Here, the parties disagree about the first two elements: the nature of the duties and whether Officer Kent acted in good faith. It is undisputed that Officer Kent was acting within the course and scope of his employment, the third element.

B. Scope and Standard of Review

Summary judgment under rule 166a(c) of the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure is proper only when the movant establishes that there is no genuine issue of material fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Randall’s Food Mkts., Inc. v. Johnson, 891 S.W.2d 640, 644 (Tex.1995); Lawson v. B Four [727]*727Corp., 888 S.W.2d 31, 34 (Tex.App. — Houston [1st Dist.] 1994, writ denied). In reviewing the rendition of summary judgment, we assume all evidence favorable to the nonmovant is true. Johnson, 891 S.W.2d at 644; Lawson, 888 S.W.2d at 33. We indulge every reasonable inference and resolve any reasonable doubt in favor of the nonmovant. Science Spectrum, Inc. v. Martinez, 941 S.W.2d 910, 911 (Tex.1997). A defendant may obtain summary judgment by conclusively establishing all elements of an affirmative defense, such as immunity, as a matter of law. Id.; Jones v. Legal Copy, Inc., 846 S.W.2d 922, 924 (Tex.App. — Houston [1st Dist.] 1993, no writ).

C. Discretionary v. Ministerial

Appellants assert Kent failed to establish the first element of official immunity: that his duties were discretionary. Appellants argue Kent’s duties at the time of the accident were ministerial.

If an action involves personal deliberation, decision, and judgment, it is discretionary; an action that requires obedience to orders or the performance of a duty to which the employee has no choice is ministerial. Chambers, 883 S.W.2d at 654. The distinction between these two categories is often one of degree because any official act that is ministerial will still require the employee to use some discretion in its performance. Id. In determining whether an act is discretionary, the issue is whether an employee was performing a discretionary function, not whether he had the discretion to do an allegedly wrongful act while discharging that function or whether the employee’s job description included discretionary duties. Id. at 653.

Appellants concede that Kent was performing discretionary duties when he was conducting the driving test on the roadways, ie., when he was directing Ms. Cano during the road test. However, appellants argue that once they had returned to the DPS office parking lot, all that remained to be done was the parking of the car, which did not involve discretionary actions by Kent. We disagree.

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Bluebook (online)
35 S.W.3d 723, 2000 Tex. App. LEXIS 8049, 2000 WL 1752898, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ramos-v-texas-department-of-public-safety-texapp-2000.