Court Opinion

ID: 9770763
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 16:21:01.167852+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:20.532983
License: Public Domain

GONZALEZ, Justice,
dissenting from Order to Supplement the Record.
The parties have briefed and argued this case, and we have accepted the submission. Marks asks us to hold that he is entitled to prevail regardless of what is contained in the sealed record. Thus, this case presents us with a straightforward legal issue, and there are no difficulties in answering the questions presented. Rather than rule on the merits *616on record before us, the Court on its own motion takes the extraordinary step of ordering supplementation of the record. I would decide the case on the same record that was presented to the court of appeals and our Court without complaint from either party. Thus, I dissent.
The Court acknowledges that it was Marks’s burden to present a record sufficient to establish error requiring reversal. See Tex.R.App.P. 50(d). Marks admits that he knew of the defect while the ease was in the court of appeals. His position in the court of appeals and in this Court is that it is unnecessary to know the contents of the sealed record to decide the case in his favor, and that his designation of the “statement of facts” was sufficient to preclude the adverse presumptions normally applied when the appellant has not filed a complete statement of facts. In his brief in our Court, the only relief Marks requested was that we'deny the Government’s application for writ of error. When questioned at oral argument, his counsel acknowledged that he knew the record was missing, but reiterated:
[0]ur complaint is that the procedure that was followed was dead wrong, and that procedure can be inferred from the statement of facts and transcript that is before this Court today. One doesn’t have to see what [the Government’s lawyer] had said to the trial judge to know that the procedure that was followed is in violation not only of Rule 76, but fundamental principles of due process.
Marks’s counsel never intimated that, alternatively, we should order supplementation of the record.
While it is usually desirable to decide a case on a full record, as the Court acknowledges, under our current rules, perfecting the record is the appellant’s duty. Tex. R.App.P. 50(d); see Christiansen v. Prezelski, 782 S.W.2d 842, 843 (Tex.1990) (holding that without a complete record, an appellate court cannot ascertain whether a trial court ruling is harmful in the context of the entire case). A reviewing court may order the record supplemented, but only under circumstances consistent with the rule for amending the record. See Tex.R.App.P. 55(a)-(c). Rule 55 reflects a concern that haphazard presentation of the record will often unreasonably delay disposition of the ease. When the case has already been submitted, the delay will involve more than merely waiting to get the record. If the supplementation changes the complexion of the ease, the court must consider whether basic fairness requires allowing the parties to re-brief and re-argue the case in light of the additions to the record.
More fundamentally, the appellate rules reflect a policy that our Court decide a case in the same posture that was presented to the court of appeals. Ultimately, we focus on whether the court of appeals’ judgment was correct. We may reverse only if there is error in the judgment, and we must render the judgment the court of appeals should have rendered. Tex.R.App.P. 182, 184. When we order supplemental records, we decide a case that was never before the court of appeals. Allowing supplementation at this level of review contravenes our Rules of Appellate Procedure and undermines the role and authority of the intermediate appellate courts.
I admit that there may be circumstances in which this kind of unusual action by our Court would be appropriate. However, our Court gives no guidance about the circumstances under which it will take it upon itself to perfect the record when none of the parties have asked for it. The Court’s justification is that this is a special ease “which has no close precedent in Texas law, which involves by all accounts a procedure that is extraordinary in any jurisdiction, and which involves fundamental interests.” 960 S.W.2d at 615. This rationale provides no clues for future litigants to predict when the appellant may be relieved of the duty to perfect the record. There is no explanation as to what distinguishes this ease from other cases of first impression with novel procedural questions and what makes this case and the rights implicated here any more “fundamental” than the others we deal with every day. If standards exist for when our Court, on its own, will order supplementation of the record, then the Court should clearly articulate those guidelines before taking such precipitous action. We must play the hand that the *617parties have dealt us. Otherwise, the bench and bar who rely on Rules 50(d) and 55 do so at their peril.
I see no reason to give this case special treatment. I would review the ease in the same posture as presented to the court of appeals and resolve it as the parties have asked. I would not order supplementation on our own motion without establishing criteria for future eases. Because the supplementation changes the complexion of the case and the standard of review, basic fairness requires at a minimum that the parties be allowed to re-brief and re-argue the case.