Court Opinion

ID: 9647100
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 13:23:30.622198+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:45.533048
License: Public Domain

HEDGES, Justice,
dissenting in part and concurring in part.
I dissent from the decision to hear this case en banc. I join the majority in reversing the judgment and remanding the ease for a new trial. However, I note that there is much that is wrong with Section C of the majority opinion, entitled “Exclusion of Valuation Testimony.” In Section C, the majority first applies the wrong law, and then, when traversing the most difficult ground of its analysis, errs once more. The majority should have held that the husband and his partner, Hickson, as owners of the corporation, could testify as lay witnesses to the value of the corporation.
The majority intensively examines the subjects of disclosure of expert witnesses, “good cause” for failing to designate expert witnesses, supplementing discovery responses that concern the opinions of expert witnesses, etc. Absolutely none of this discussion is relevant, because the testimony admitted on valuation at trial was not expert testimony. The statement of facts shows that when the husband tried to introduce testimony on valuation, the wife’s attorney objected. After hearing argument from both attorneys on the issue of admissibility, the trial court stated:
The Court having reviewed the cases cited to the Court and heard the arguments of counsel is going to allow lay opinion testimony only by Collins and Hickson.
(Emphasis added.) Could it be any more clear that the issue here is whether lay testimony on valuation was admissible, not whether expert testimony on valuation was admissible?
The husband argues that the trial court was correct in admitting the testimony on valuation because he and Hickson could properly testify on the issue as lay witnesses. He is absolutely right: an owner or anyone with personal knowledge can assist the fact finder by expressing a lay opinion on the value of real or personal property. See Laprade v. Laprade, 784 S.W.2d 490, 492 (Tex.App.—Fort Worth 1990, writ denied) (value of corporation); Bavarian Autohaus, Inc. v. Holland, 570 S.W.2d 110, 115 (Tex.Civ.App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 1978, no writ); Tex.R.Civ.Evid. 701. The admission of such testimony should not be disturbed on appeal unless the admission was an abuse of discretion. Laprade, 784 S.W.2d at 492; Hochheim Prairie Farm Mut. Ins. Ass’n v. Burnett, 698 S.W.2d 271, 276 (Tex.App.—Fort Worth 1985, no writ). The holdings in cases like Laprade and Bavarian Autohaus show that the trial court’s admission of the indisputably lay testimony was permissible. The authorities cited by the majority that define a party’s duty in designating an expert and in disclosing and supplementing an expert’s opinion are completely inapplicable for the very reason that they concern expert opinion, which, again, is not at issue here.1
The majority goes on to state that because the husband and his attorney said at the husband’s deposition that the husband would not provide any testimony regarding valuation, which necessarily includes expert and lay testimony, the husband should have supplemented his response to discovery and informed the wife before trial that he intended to give evidence on valuation at trial after all. The majority concludes that the testimony was inadmissible because the husband failed to show good cause for not supplementing his response.
*807There is no statute, no case, no authority whatsoever for the proposition that a party who says in a deposition that he will not testify on a matter at trial must “supplement” his deposition answers if he changes his mind and does decide to testify on the matter. In fact, one court of appeals has correctly stated as recently as last year that “[tjhere are no Texas cases that specifically require a deponent to supplement his deposition testimony. ” Navistar Int’l Transp. Corp. v. Crim Truck & Tractor Co., 883 S.W.2d 687, 691 (Tex.App.—Texarkana 1994, writ denied) (emphasis added). The same court also noted that “[n]or is there a procedural rule that requires a nonparty deponent” — like Hickson here — “to supplement his deposition testimony.” Id.
The fact that there is no authority requiring a party who says in a deposition that he will not testify on a matter at trial to “supplement” his deposition answers if he changes his mind and does decide to testify is critical. In fact, it is not just critical; it is dispositive. As noted above, the standard of review for the admission of the valuation testimony is abuse of discretion. See Laprade, 784 S.W.2d at 492; Hochheim Prairie Farm, 698 S.W.2d at 276. An abuse of discretion in the admission of evidence occurs when the trial court acts contrary to guiding rules or principles. Reichhold Chems., Inc. v. Puremco Mfg. Co., 854 S.W.2d 240, 247 (Tex.App.—Waco 1993, writ denied). If, as the Navistar court correctly noted, there is no ease that specifically requires a deponent, party or non-party, to supplement his deposition testimony, how can the trial court have acted contrary to any guiding rules or principles in allowing the valuation testimony? Put another way, how could the trial court have acted “contrary to any guiding rules or principles” when there are no specific guiding rules or principles? The answer, of course, is that the trial court did not abuse its discretion.
Because there is no authority that required the husband to “supplement” the deposition testimony on valuation, Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 215(5), which penalizes a party for failing to supplement when the party was “under a duty” to supplement, does not apply here. The majority’s conclusion that the husband failed to show good cause for not supplementing is based on an erroneous assumption; the husband did not have to show “good cause” under rule 215 for not supplementing because there was no authority requiring him to supplement in the first place.
Even though the valuation testimony was admissible, the wife was not left without a response to it. She had at her disposal a very potent antidote to the testimony: impeachment. This is precisely what we said in Ramsey v. Lucky Stores, Inc., 853 S.W.2d 623 (Tex.App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 1993, writ denied). In that ease, we disagreed with the appellants that a Fort Worth opinion2 “imposes a general duty on a deponent to supplement his deposition testimony.” Id. at 630 n. 9. We expressly declined to decide whether Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 166b(6)(a) requires a deponent to supplement his deposition testimony. Id. at 630. In our discussion, however, we stated that “[w]e do note in general that any witness who testifies at trial differently from his deposition is subject to impeachment with the deposition testimony.” Id. at 630 n. 9. The wife could have debilitated or even abolished the credibility of the husband and Hickson with deft use of their earlier statements that they would have no opinion to offer the jury on the very subject on which they were now asking the jury to accept their word.
The effect of the majority’s holding on this issue is to transform what the witnesses and the husband’s attorney said at the depositions into an imitation rule 11 agreement. The majority seeks to hold the witnesses and the husband’s attorney to what they agreed to on the record — an inviting idea until one considers that the agreement, because it was not “in writing, signed and filed with the papers as part of the record” or “made in open court and entered of record” was completely unenforceable. Tex.R.Civ.P. 11. Rule 11 mandates that “[u]nless otherwise provided in these rules, no agreement between attorneys or parties touching any suit pending will be enforced unless it be in writing, signed and filed with the papers as part *808of the record, or unless it be made in open court and entered of record.” Id. (emphasis added).
The agreement made by the witnesses and the husband’s attorney does not comply with rule 11. How, then, can it be enforced at trial? The answer is that it can’t.
For all of these reasons, I disagree with Section C of the “Combined En Bane and Panel Opinion on Motion for Rehearing.” That section presents an analysis gone badly awry and, as a consequence, a holding that is very wide of the mark.
COHEN, J., joins HEDGES, J., in this opinion. DUGGAN, J., joins HEDGES, J., on the panel submissions of this issue.

. One such inapplicable authority is Aluminum Co. of Am. v. Bullock, 870 S.W.2d 2 (Tex.1994), relied on in several areas by the majority. The issue in that case, in the words of the court that decided it, was "whether good cause under Rule 215(5) exists to allow the testimony of expert witnesses who were not previously designated by the party calling them.” Id. at 3 (emphasis added). This case, on the other hand, does not concern expert testimony, as the record explicitly demonstrates. Nor does this case have anything to do with the question of good cause; as is discussed below, the husband did not have to show good cause for not supplementing because he was not required to supplement.

. Foster v. Cunningham, 825 S.W.2d 806 (Tex.App.—Fort Worth 1992, writ denied).