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Nature of Suit Code: 365
Nature of Suit: Personal Injury - Product Liability
Cause of Action: 

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IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 19-10878

Summary Calendar

BRIDGET ALEX, Individually and on behalf of the Estate of Brandon Alex; 

JASHAWN ALEX; MICHAELLE COHEN; ESTATE OF BRANDON ALEX; 

DETREASURE COKER, 

 Plaintiffs - Appellants

v.

T-MOBILE USA, INCORPORATED; T-MOBILE US INCORPORATED, 

formerly known as MetroPCS Communications Incorporated; METROPCS 

MIDWAY RD; DEUTSCHE TELEKOM NORTH AMERICA 

INCORPORATED; T-SYSTEMS NORTH AMERICA INCORPORATED, 

 Defendants - Appellees

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ESTATE OF BRANDON ALEX, through personal representative Detreasure 

Coker; DETREASURE COKER, individually and as surviving mother of 

Brandon Alex, deceased

 

 Plaintiffs - Appellants

v.

T-MOBILE US INCORPORATED, formerly known as MetroPCS 

Communications Incorporated; T-MOBILE USA, INCORPORATED; TSYSTEMS NORTH AMERICA INCORPORATED; DEUTSCHE TELEKOM 

NORTH AMERICA INCORPORATED

 Defendants - Appellees

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

February 27, 2020

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Texas 

USDC No. 3:17-CV-1532

USDC No. 3:17-CV-2622

Before DAVIS, SMITH, and HIGGINSON, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:*

This case comes before us a second time after remand to the district 

court. See Alex v. T-Mobile USA, Inc., 776 F. App’x 205 (5th Cir. 2019). Brandon 

Alex’s family members sued T-Mobile USA, Inc., T-Mobile US, Inc. 

(collectively, “T-Mobile”), Deutsche Telkom North America, Inc., and TSystems North America, Inc. (collectively, “T-Systems”), alleging that a defect 

in their 9-1-1 technology prevented first responders from arriving in time to 

save Brandon’s life. Because, as we previously concluded, T-Mobile and TSystems are immune under Texas law, we AFFIRM the district court’s 

dismissal. 

Seven-month-old Brandon Alex was injured after falling from a daybed. 

His babysitter dialed 9-1-1 three separate times, and stayed on an unconnected 

line for over thirty minutes. Unable to connect to a dispatcher, Brandon’s 

grandmother drove him to an emergency room over an hour after the first 9-1-

1 call. Brandon was pronounced dead shortly after arriving at the hospital.

Brandon’s family members sued T-Mobile and T-Systems for claims 

arising from Brandon’s death. Both Defendants moved to dismiss, asserting 

* Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not 

be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH 

CIR. R. 47.5.4.

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statutory immunity under Texas law. Although the district court denied those 

motions, we reversed on interlocutory appeal and remanded “with instructions 

to dismiss the action against T-Mobile.” Id. at 207.

On remand, Plaintiffs argued that some of their claims survived our 

ruling. The district court disagreed. It correctly read our opinion “to mean that 

Defendants are statutorily immune from [all of] Plaintiffs’ claims,” and 

dismissed all claims against T-Mobile and T-Systems with prejudice. Plaintiffs 

now bring this second appeal. 

This court has already held that, under the Supreme Court of Texas’s 

decision in City of Dallas v. Sanchez, 494 S.W.3d 722 (Tex. 2016), Plaintiffs 

failed to allege proximate cause sufficient to overcome T-Mobile’s immunity.1

Plaintiffs’ new appeal raises many of the same arguments. Then, as now, 

Plaintiffs argued that Sanchez does not require dismissal of each of their 

claims. And then, as now, we disagreed—we directed the district court to 

“dismiss the action against T-Mobile.” Alex, 776 F. App’x at 207. 

Plaintiffs try to sidestep our prior decision by arguing that we previously 

considered only the original complaint, and not the amended complaint. The 

amended complaint, however, was part of the record in the first appeal, and 

Plaintiffs cited exclusively to it. We still determined that dismissal of “the 

action”—not a particular complaint—was required by Texas law. And 

Plaintiffs’ allegations in the amended complaint are based on the same causal 

theory: that Defendants’ technology caused Brandon’s death because it 

prevented him from receiving “timely police and/or EMT assistance.” 

1 In Sanchez, two parents alleged that a defect in the City of Dallas’s 9-1-1 system caused their 

son’s death by preventing first responders from timely responding to his overdose. The Texas Supreme 

Court announced that “the use of property that simply hinders or delays treatment does not actually 

cause the injury and does not constitute a proximate cause of an injury.” 494 S.W.3d at 726 (citations 

and quotations omitted). 

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Because T-Mobile and T-Systems are immune under Texas law, the 

district court did not err in dismissing Plaintiffs’ claims against them—we 

affirm. 

AFFIRMED; MOTION TO DISMISS APPEAL AS FRIVOLOUS 

DENIED. 

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