Court Opinion

ID: 9681868
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 08:00:00.014168+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:36.258433
License: Public Domain

CADENA, Chief Justice,
dissenting.
If, as Justice Butts holds, there is evidence to support the finding of improper conduct by appellant in only two of the three cases relied on by the State Bar, I see no basis for affirming a judgment which imposes sanctions based on the premise that the State Bar proved all of the violations assessed in its pleadings. It may be conceded that a trial judge has a wide discretion in determining the sanctions to be imposed on an attorney who has violated the disciplinary rules and that, in the exercise of such discretion, the court may assess one punishment for the violation of several rules or a separate sanction for the violation of each rule. State v. Baker, 539 S.W.2d 367, 375 (Tex.Civ.App. — Austin 1976, writ ref d n.r.e.). Nor would I challenge the view that the trial court, “in good faith and using its best considered judgment, fit the punishment to the offenses before it ...” State v. Baker, 559 S.W.2d 145, 147 (Tex.Civ.App. — Austin 1977, writ ref d n.r.e.). But in this case the trial court fixed the punishment to fit what it mistakenly believed were three offenses when, in fact, the evidence showed only two violations. I have difficulty characterizing as “sound” an exercise of discretion based on facts which do not exist. I cannot accept the notion that the trial court is vested with a discretion so broad that it can impose sanctions based on the commission of three violations when the record conclusively establishes that only two violations have occurred.
The first opinion in State v. Baker, supra, supports the conclusion that the judgment in this case should be reversed and the cause remanded to the trial court to consider, in its discretion, the sanctions to be imposed on appellant for two violations rather than three. In that case the Austin Court concluded that the trial court erroneously imposed sanctions in the belief that there were fewer violations than those found by the appellate court. The appellate court, while voicing the traditional statements concerning the trial court’s discretion, remanded the case so that the sanctions imposed would correspond to the true facts. 539 S.W.2d at 375. Cf. Ex parte Lee, 704 S.W.2d 15, 17 (Tex.1986).