Court Opinion

ID: 9477717
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 06:29:27.291831+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:46:00.613362
License: Public Domain

JOHNSON, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I agree with the majority that alleged service defects under long arm statutes áre reviewable by this Court as a threshold consideration of due process. The majority, however, exaggerates the degree of strict compliance required in Texas, and I dissent as to the conclusion that American Steel defectively served Fred Davidson.
The majority’s reversal of the district court judgment rests on the mailing of service to “Zed” rather than “Fred” Davidson. By comparison to those service defects that have crippled jurisdiction in Texas, I find that the error in this case does not rise to the level of a jurisdictional defect. Those Texas cases in which service fell short of strict compliance without exception pose more substantive defects than the error in this case.1 The recognized *1524defects go either to an explicit statutory element that lacked proof in the record or to a necessary allegation that was completely devoid from the record. No Texas court has gone as far as the majority in this case chooses to go.
The strictest requirement of compliance that the majority can marshal from a Texas case is the inadequacy of providing a “last known address” to the Secretary of State without alleging it to be the home or office address. Verges, 642 S.W.2d 820. In this case, American Steel gave the correct office address. The address included the name of the company, Davidson Saw Mill & Lumber Company, that was joined as a defendant in Texas. The mailing did not go to some stranger; rather, as the majority points out in its first footnote, it was received by Fred Davidson’s son-in-law. That the long arm of service came so close to Fred Davidson without reaching him is not a shortfall of failed statutory compliance. Cf. TXXN, 682 S.W.2d 706. It stretches the truth, not the service, to conclude that this is a case of complete misnaming rather than partial misspelling.
I believe that the district court correctly recognized the Texas default judgment and therefore would affirm the summary judgment in favor of American Steel.

. On direct appeal, Texas courts have found strict compliance with the long arm statute lacking where: 1) the plaintiff did not allege that the defendant was a foreign corporation, Alpha Guard, Inc. v. Callahan Chemical Co., 568 S.W.2d 448, 449 (Tx.Civ.App.1978); 2) the plaintiff did not allege that the defendant did not have a regular place of business in Texas, Public Storage Prop. VII Ltd. v. Rankin, 678 S.W.2d 590 (Tx.Ct.App.1984); McKanna v. Edgar, 388 S.W.2d 927 (Tx.1965); 3) the plaintiff did not support the naked allegation that the defendant’s agent received process. Encore Builders v. Wells, 636 S.W.2d 722 (Tx.Ct.App.1982); Bankers Life & Casualty Co. v. Watson, 436 S.W.2d 404 (Tx.Ct.App.1968); 4) the plaintiff did not state that the location given for the defendant was his residence, Franecke v. Dolenz, 668 S.W.2d 481 (Tx.Ct.App.1984); 5) the record did not show, by certificate or otherwise, that process had been sent by the Secretary of State in accordance with the long arm statute, Roberts v. Niekerk, 730 S.W.2d 341 (Tx.Ct.App.1987); McGuffy v. Perfected Indus. Prods. Inc., 683 S.W.2d 781 (Tx.Ct.App.1984); Whitney v. L & L Realty Corp., 500 S.W.2d 94 (Tx.1973); and 6) service was sent to the last known address which was not alleged to be the home or home office of the defendant, Verges v. Lomas & Nettleton Financial Corp., 642 S.W.2d 820 (Tx.Ct.App.1982).
By contrast, Texas courts on direct appeal have upheld default judgments where: 1) not the Secretary of State but an employee of the Secretary was served, Capitol Brick, Inc. v. Fleming Mfg. Co., 722 S.W.2d 399 (Tx.1986); 2) there was no verification that the defendant had received service, but the letter had been sent by registered or certified mail, return receipt requested, Bonewitz v. Bonewitz, 726 S.W.2d 227, 231 (Tx.Ct.App.1987); 3) service did not reach the defendant but was returned with the notation that the letter was "not deliverable as addressed, unable to forward,” TXXN, Inc. v. D/FW Steel Co., 632 S.W.2d 706 (Tx.Ct.App. 1982).