Supreme Court of Texas

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No. 21-0643

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Virendra Patel, Premier West Hospitality Corp., Zeal Hotels 

Group LLC, The Colony Hospitality Corp., and Huntley 

Construction, LLC,

Petitioners,

v.

Nations Renovations, LLC, 

Respondent

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On Petition for Review from the

Court of Appeals for the Second District of Texas

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PER CURIAM 

Justice Lehrmann did not participate in this decision. 

Final judgments necessarily resolve all claims for all parties to a 

case. Multiple jurisdictional consequences follow from whether a 

judgment is final. For one thing, a final judgment starts the clock for 

when a trial court loses its plenary power—its jurisdiction to revise its 

judgment or, with some exceptions, see, e.g., TEX. R. APP. P. 24.3, to take
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any other actions in the case. This mandamus proceeding1 concerns 

whether a judgment that described itself as final really was final. We 

hold that it was. Therefore, the district court’s plenary power had long 

expired before it undertook to revise its final judgment, and the order 

modifying the judgment was void. We conditionally grant mandamus 

relief directing the district court to withdraw that order.

This case arises from a construction-project dispute involving a 

hotel, but the underlying facts are largely immaterial. All that matters 

for present purposes is that the parties agreed to and did resolve their 

complicated dispute via arbitration. Specifically, the Colony Hospitality 

Corporation (CHC), one of the relators in this Court, is a propertyholding company that had a construction project on a hotel. CHC hired 

Huntley Construction—another relator—as a general contractor, and 

Huntley hired real party in interest Nations Renovations, LLC as a 

subcontractor. A dispute arose between Nations, CHC, and Huntley 

regarding the extent and quality of the work that was performed.

Nations filed two lawsuits—one in Dallas County and the other 

in Denton County. Rather than litigate in multiple forums, Nations, 

Huntley, and CHC broadly submitted “all claims, controversies, and 

demands by and between them arising out of and related to the disputes 

set forth in the Litigation to binding arbitration.” The parties agreed 

that the “Award rendered by the Arbitrator is final and binding and 

shall be subject to entry of judgment by a court having jurisdiction to 

1 Relators filed a petition for review that requested mandamus relief as 

an alternative. We refer to “petitioners” as relators and to the “respondent” as 

the real party in interest.
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enter judgment.” The Denton County lawsuit became the vehicle for 

that judgment; the Dallas County lawsuit was non-suited. 

The arbitrator issued a final arbitration award in January 2019, 

describing it as a “full and final settlement of all claims submitted to 

this arbitration.” Nations was awarded $85,000 against Huntley, and 

CHC was awarded $10,000 in attorney’s fees. As a result, Nations 

sought $75,000 from Huntley. 

On February 22, 2019, before the district court entered its 

judgment confirming the award, Nations added Virendra Patel and Zeal 

Hotels Group as additional defendants. Nations alleged that Zeal, CHC, 

and Patel were alter egos of Huntley and asserted vicarious-liability 

claims against the parties for fraudulent transfer and sham to 

perpetrate a fraud, based on transactions Nations discovered after the 

close of evidence. 

On April 5, 2019, at Nations’ request, the district court entered 

its judgment confirming the arbitration award. The judgment stated: 

IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED, ADJUDGED AND 

DECREED that the Award is hereby confirmed, and 

Nations, Huntley, and CHC are therefore bound by the 

terms therein[,] . . . that Nations have all writs and 

processes to aid in execution of this judgment[,] . . . that all 

relief not granted herein is denied[,] . . . [and] that this is a 

final judgment and appealable. 

This language was drafted by Nations, which moved for entry of 

judgment.2 To minimize confusion, we refer to this judgment as the 

“Judgment.” 

2 Twelve days later, on April 17, 2019, Nations added Premier West 

Hospitality Corporation as yet another defendant. Nations further added a 
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Approximately a year and a half later, on October 22, 2020, 

Nations moved the district court to modify the Judgment to clarify that 

it was not truly a “final judgment” but was merely interlocutory. 

Nations asserted that the Judgment’s language relating to finality 

referred only to the judgment against Huntley. On January 21, 2021, 

unsure of whether the Judgment was, in fact, final, the district court 

hesitantly granted Nations’ motion and modified the Judgment to reflect 

that it was interlocutory. Because of its doubt that it had jurisdiction to 

act, the district court sua sponte certified the question for interlocutory 

appeal. Both parties agreed that the court of appeals should address 

this jurisdictional question, but the court of appeals refused to do so. 

2021 WL 2461798, at *1 (Tex. App.—Fort Worth June 17, 2021). 

We therefore proceed to our analysis of whether the Judgment is 

final. By definition, a final judgment must dispose of all parties and all 

claims in the underlying case. The parties dispute the applicability of 

“[t]he presumption that a judgment rendered after a conventional trial 

on the merits is final and appealable.” Lehmann v. Har-Con Corp., 39 

S.W.3d 191, 199 (Tex. 2001). The judgment here was not one on 

technical grounds, like a plea to the jurisdiction, a default, a summary 

judgment, or the like. See id. at 199-200. It was an arbitration on the 

merits with proceedings that substituted for those a court would have 

held but for the arbitration agreement. This Court, however, has not 

previously addressed whether such an arbitration proceeding in a 

conspiracy claim regarding the alleged fraudulent transfers—stating that 

Zeal, CHC, Premier, and Patel were jointly and severally liable for the amount 

set forth in the arbitration award against Huntley.
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context like this one would implicate the presumption of finality. We 

need not resolve that question today, either, because regardless of how 

we might answer it, finality can be and is established in other ways.3 

Solely for argument’s sake, therefore, we assume that this Judgment did 

not follow a comprehensive arbitration equivalent to a conventional trial 

on the merits.

Specifically, courts will deem a judgment without a trial to be 

final “(1) [when the judgment] actually disposes of every pending claim 

and party or (2) [when] it clearly and unequivocally states that it finally 

disposes of all claims and parties, even if it does not actually do so.” In 

re Guardianship of Jones, 629 S.W.3d 921, 924 (Tex. 2021) (citing 

Lehmann, 39 S.W.3d at 205). If the judgment clearly and unequivocally 

states that it finally disposes of all claims and parties, the assessment 

is resolved in favor of finding finality, and the reviewing court cannot 

review the record. In re Elizondo, 544 S.W.3d 824, 827 (Tex. 2018).4 

Therefore, we begin by determining whether the Judgment is clearly 

and unequivocally final on its face. 

3 Relators argue that the parties agreed to a final and binding 

arbitration of “all claims, controversies, and demands by and between them 

arising out of and related to the disputes set forth in the Litigation,” so the 

district court’s confirmation of that final arbitration award satisfies the 

Lehmann presumption. Nations argues that the secondary claims—those that 

were added after the conclusion of the arbitration—prevent a presumption of 

finality from applying in this case because, it contends, the Judgment did not 

and could not address those claims. We need not resolve any of the embedded 

questions presented by this aspect of the parties’ dispute given our resolution 

on other grounds. 

4 “[R]eviewing courts . . . look at the record only if the order [i]s not clear 

and unequivocal.” Elizondo, 544 S.W.3d at 827 (internal quotation marks

omitted).
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This Court’s jurisprudence contains many examples of 

statements that, standing alone, cannot satisfy the clear-andunequivocal standard. On its own, merely stating that the order is 

“final” is not enough. Lehmann, 39 S.W.3d at 203-05. Stating that the 

order is “appealable” is also not enough when standing alone. Id. 

Including a Mother Hubbard clause that “all relief not granted is denied” 

is not enough by itself. Id. at 203-04. To determine what are sufficient 

indicia of finality, the Court opined that “there must be some other clear 

indication that the trial court intended the order to completely dispose 

of the entire case.” Id. at 205. The question then becomes how this 

“clear indication” standard can be satisfied. 

As we have made clear, no magic language is required. Bella 

Palma, LLC v. Young, 601 S.W.3d 799, 801 (Tex. 2020). Instead, “a trial 

court may express its intent to render a final judgment by describing its 

action as (1) final, (2) a disposition of all claims and parties, and 

(3) appealable.” Id. (citing In re R.R.K., 590 S.W.3d 535, 543 (Tex. 

2019)). This standard provides an outline of several statements that, 

while insufficient when standing alone, together form a clear indication 

of finality. The Judgment in this case provides a similar combination of 

statements.

Several statements listed in the Judgment constitute indicia of 

finality. And while we agree that each statement alone would not 

necessarily be enough, together they must be. Without a doubt, the 

Judgment lists two of the three finality statements referenced above: 

that the judgment is “final” and that the judgment is “appealable.” The 

Judgment does not explicitly include the third statement—that all 
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claims and parties are disposed of—but provides two additional 

statements that compensate for any lack of that precise formulation: 

“that Nations have all writs and processes to aid in execution of this 

judgment” and “that all relief not granted herein is denied.” Together, 

these statements provide the basis for determining that the Judgment 

did effectively convey that all claims and parties are disposed of. To hold 

otherwise would require the very magic words that we disclaim in 

undertaking an analysis of finality. These four statements clearly and 

unequivocally express that the Judgment was final.

Further, nothing supports the claim that the single Judgment 

could have been “final” as to some parties and interlocutory as to others. 

A judgment cannot be “partially final” or “sometimes final and 

sometimes not.” Chaos would follow from such a rule, in which a 

supposed final judgment in a single case turns out, years later, to have 

been interlocutory all along. That would be the consequence if the 

judgment was final as to some parties or some claims. The judgment is 

either final or it is not. 

We emphasize that we do not charge Nations with making 

improper arguments or with any subjective intent to violate the 

integrity of the judicial process. Quite the contrary. We hold only that 

the Judgment rendered was clearly and unequivocally final. Whether it 

was error to render a final judgment is of no consequence because 

Nations did not appeal the Judgment within the statutory timeframe. 

Given that Nations prepared the Judgment, this is unsurprising—but 

also makes it less justifiable to depart from our normal rules even if we 
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were so inclined.5 “If the order contains a ‘clear and unequivocal’ finality 

phrase disposing of the entire case, the order is final, and the failure to 

actually dispose of all claims and parties renders the order erroneous 

but not interlocutory.” Jones, 629 S.W.3d at 924. 

As we have stated before, “[a] party who is uncertain whether a 

judgment is final must err on the side of appealing or risk losing the 

right to appeal.” Lehmann, 39 S.W.3d at 196. Nations’ delayed motion 

for modification of the Judgment “request[ed] that the Court . . . clarify 

and confirm that it is an interlocutory judgment and d[id] not dispose of 

the entire case.” But the time to request clarity had long passed. “Even 

if [Nations] disagreed that the order was final, [it] should have treated 

it as though it was.” Elizondo, 544 S.W.3d at 827. 

Accordingly, without hearing oral argument, TEX. R. APP. P.

52.8(c), we treat the petition for review as a petition for writ of 

mandamus, see CMH Homes v. Perez, 340 S.W.3d 444, 453-54 (Tex. 

2011), and conditionally grant the petition. The order granting the 

motion to modify the Judgment is void, and we direct the district court 

5 Relators also assert that we could reach the same bottom line by 

holding that, whether the Judgment was in fact final or not, Nations is 

judicially estopped from contesting its finality. This argument relies on a 

multitude of representations that Nations has made throughout the course of 

these proceedings in which it received relief (like a post-judgment writ of 

garnishment without bond) that was available only based on its assurance that 

the Judgment was in fact final. The doctrine of “[j]udicial estoppel precludes 

a party who successfully maintains a position in one proceeding from 

afterwards adopting a clearly inconsistent position in another proceeding to 

obtain an unfair advantage.” Ferguson v. Bldg. Materials Corp. of Am., 295 

S.W.3d 642, 643 (Tex. 2009). Because we hold that the Judgment was final, 

we need not assess the applicability of judicial estoppel (or any other doctrine) 

that would lead to the same effective outcome.
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to withdraw it. The writ will issue only if the district court does not 

comply. 

OPINION DELIVERED: February 10, 2023