Second Court of Appeals

Summaries of Civil Opinions and Published Criminal Opinions Issued - Week of January 3, 2017.

NOTE: Summaries are prepared by the court's staff attorneys and law clerks for public information only and reflect his or her interpretation alone of the facts and legal issues. The summaries are not part of the court's opinion in the case and should not be cited to, quoted, or relied upon as the opinion of the court.

Links to full text of opinions (PDF version) can be accessed by clicking the cause number.

Compass Bank v. Durant, No. 02-15-00390-CV (Jan. 5, 2017) (Sudderth, J., joined by Meier, J.; Gabriel, J., concurs and dissents with opinion).

Held:  The terms of the parties’ swap agreement and loan documents are not inconsistent with each other.  Therefore, the trial court erred by granting summary judgment for Appellee on his breach of contract and declaratory judgment claims and by declaring that Appellee had the right to prepay the amount due under the note without the payment of any fee under the swap agreement because the plain language of the swap agreement and related loan documents obligated Appellee to pay the early termination fee.  Appellant was not entitled to summary judgment on its cross-motion for summary judgment because Appellee raised a fact issue that precluded summary judgment on his breach of contract claim and Appellant’s grounds as presented in its motion regarding Appellee’s declaratory judgment claim did not entitle it to summary judgment under Texas law.

Concurrence and Dissent:  A fair reading of Compass’s summary-judgment motion shows that Compass moved for judgment as a matter of law on Durant’s request for declaratory relief on the same grounds it asserted Durant’s breach-of-contract claim failed.  Therefore, the court should render judgment in Compass’s favor on Durant’s request for declaratory relief based on the majority’s correct interpretation of the parties’ unambiguous contract, which prevented the declaration Durant sought.

Burton v. State, No. 02-16-00067-CR (Jan. 5, 2017) (Sudderth, J., joined by Livingston, C.J., and Gabriel, J.).

Held:  We are bound by the court of criminal appeals’ holding in Cooper v. State, 430 S.W.3d 426, 427 (Tex. Crim. App. 2014), that separate convictions for aggravated robbery based on the two underlying methods of robbery—causing bodily injury to or threatening the same victim during a home invasion—violated double jeopardy.  Therefore, the trial court did not err in charging in the disjunctive aggravated robbery based on the same two underlying methods of robbery.