Opinion ID: 2405518
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: application for change of venue

Text: Respondents, John F. Downs, Vena Powers et al., and F. D. Shotwell et al., filed separate suits against Petitioner in June and in October, 1960. The suits were for damages to their farms resulting from Petitioner's sewage disposal plant which commenced operations on July 10, 1958. The cases were originally set for trial in December, 1960, but were continued on motion of Petitioner and reset for trial on March 20, 1961. Prior thereto, on February 6, 1961, the causes were consolidated upon motion of Respondents. Trial of the consolidated cases was continued by agreement and reset for March 27, 1961. Again, at the request of Petitioner, the consolidated cases were reset for trial on April 17, 1961, on which date a jury panel was ordered, with no other case set for trial. Respondents filed their first amended original petition on April 6, 1961. On April 17, 1961, at 8:50 a.m., Petitioner filed an application for change of venue. Petitioner and Respondents announced ready for trial, after which Petitioner urged its application for change of venue. Respondents did not file an affidavit controverting the application for change of venue as required by Rule 258, Texas Rules of Civil Procedure. The court directed the parties to proceed with the examination of the jury panel and thereafter overruled the application. On May 9, 1961, subsequent to the trial of the cases, Respondents requested findings and conclusions with respect to the order of the court overruling the application for change of venue, in response to which the court filed findings and conclusions amending its original order overruling the application and making the findings and conclusions a part of the order. Among other things, the court found that the motion was not timely filed; that it was filed at such a time as to cause delay and disruption of the court's docket; that the special setting on April 17, 1961, was at the request of Petitioner; and that at no time did Petitioner apprise the court of its intention to seek a change of venue. Rule 258, T.R.C.P., provides as follows: Where such application for a change of venue is duly made, it shall be granted, unless the credibility of those making such application, or their means of knowledge or the truth of the facts set out in the said application are attacked by the affidavit of a credible person; when thus attacked, the issue thus formed shall be tried by the judge, and the application either granted or refused. Rule 258 by its terms is mandatorily operative. It provides the only means by which issue can be joined. The affidavit of a credible person attacking the application for a change of venue in the respects specified in Rule 258 is prerequisite to the invocation of the discretionary powers of a trial judge to determine if the applicant can obtain a fair and impartial trial; if the affidavit is not filed, the trial judge is required to remove the cause pursuant to Rule 258 or, if applicable, Rule 260. Bennett v. Jackson, Tex.Civ.App., 172 S.W.2d 395, wr. ref. w. o. m.; Taylor v. Batte, Tex.Civ.App., 145 S.W.2d 1116, no writ hist. The fundamental principle involved was stated in Freeman v. Ortiz, Tex.Civ. App., 136 S.W. 113, affirmed 106 Tex. 1, 153 S.W. 304: The purpose of a change of venue is that the parties to a suit may obtain a fair and impartial trial, for a judgment obtained without such a trial is a travesty upon justice and, if upheld, a disgrace to the law. Rule 258 presupposes, and we think properly, that a change of venue is necessary in the interests of justice if the application therefor stands unchallenged in the manner prescribed. The trial judge was therefore under the duty of removing the cases pursuant to Petitioner's application for change of venue and this cause must be reversed and remanded for this purpose, and for other reasons now to be discussed. We preface our discussion of Petitioner's pleas of limitation with the following explanatory comments. In resolving Petitioner's point of error urging that Respondents' suits were barred by the two-year statute of limitations, we are required to review the holding of the Court of Civil Appeals in City of Abilene v. Bailey, 345 S.W.2d 540, in which we refused the application for writ of error with the notation no reversible error. This is notwithstanding that here, as in Bailey, under the factual situations involved, the basic question of the essential elements of a cause of action to support a recovery for a taking or damaging of private property for a public use under Article I, Section 17 of the Constitution, Vernon's Ann.St., was not properly preserved for review by this Court. This is recognized by Petitioner in its supplemental brief filed herein, in which it is stated that Petitioner's point of error presenting this problem was not carried forward in its motion for rehearing in the Court of Civil Appeals in Bailey, and was dropped in the instant case because of our refusal of the application for writ of error in Bailey. Also, as will be later developed, our holdings with respect to Petitioner's plea of limitation require, in turn, consideration of Petitioner's point of error attacking the form of the issues submitted by the court to determine the question of damages.