Court Opinion

ID: 9390229
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-04-27 07:09:21.768958+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:18:32.651053
License: Public Domain

COURT OF APPEALS
                                   EIGHTH DISTRICT OF TEXAS
                                        EL PASO, TEXAS

                                                        §

    IN RE:                                              §                 No. 08-23-00008-CV

    FRANK ENRIQUEZ, Individually and as the             §          AN ORIGINAL PROCEEDING
    Personal Representative of the Estate of
    CHRISTINE RAMIREZ, and for all wrongful             §                   IN MANDAMUS
    death beneficiaries,
                                                        §
                                           Relator.
                                                        §

                                              OPINION

         Relator Frank Enriquez seeks a writ of mandamus directing the trial court to grant his

motion for leave to file a fourth amended petition. We deny the petition for a writ of mandamus as

moot.

                                             BACKGROUND

         Enriquez jointly filed suit with his wife, Christine Ramirez, in 2011 alleging that real-party-

in-interest Dr. Victor M. Villalobos’s 1 negligent medical treatment of Ramirez caused him to

misdiagnose her lung cancer. Ramirez died on June 18, 2012. Consequently, Ramirez was removed

1
 In addition to Villalobos, Enriquez also named as defendants Wedgewood Medical Center, Mt. West Family Health
Center, Trawood Family Health Center, Jennifer A. Gomez, Fabian De La Rosa, and Miles B. May. For simplicity,
we will refer to all of the defendants/real-parties-in-interest as Villalobos.
as a plaintiff and was replaced by Enriquez in both his individual capacity and in his capacity as

the personal representative of her estate.

        The trial court issued a scheduling order setting the case for a jury trial on January 24,

2023. It also set a November 25, 2022, deadline for amending or supplementing pleadings.

Enriquez filed a motion for leave to file a fourth amended petition on December 14, 2022, stating

that opinions revealed during his expert witness’s recent deposition made amendment necessary.

Villalobos opposed the motion. After holding a hearing, the trial court denied the motion for leave

to amend, and Enriquez filed this petition for a writ of mandamus five days later. The trial court

cancelled the January 24 trial date the same day the petition for a writ of mandamus was filed.

                                              ANALYSIS

        Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 63 permits parties to amend their pleadings “provided, that

any pleadings . . . offered for filing within seven days of the date of trial or thereafter, or after such

time as may be ordered by the judge under Rule 166, shall be filed only after leave of the judge is

obtained.” Here, Enriquez was required to seek leave of court to file his fourth amended petition

because he sought to file it after the November 25, 2022, deadline the trial court set in its

scheduling order. A trial re-setting, however, has the effect of nullifying a deadline set by a

scheduling order. Harris v. Mastec North America, Inc., No. 05-19-00955-CV, 2020 WL 6305028,

at *3 (Tex. App.—Dallas 2020, no pet.) (mem. op.); compare Holmes v. GMAC, Inc., 458 S.W.3d

85, 94-95 (Tex. App.—El Paso 2014, no pet.) (holding that the deadlines in a scheduling order did

not reset after a continuance of the trial date when the scheduling order “expressly provided that a

reset or continuance of the initial trial setting would not alter any deadline established in the order

unless otherwise provided by order of the trial court”). Consequently, the trial court’s cancellation

of the January 24 trial date nullified the scheduling order’s November 25 deadline for Enriquez to

                                                    2
file an amended petition. The mandamus record does not indicate that a new trial date has been

set. Enriquez, therefore, does not now require leave of court to file an amended petition.

        Villalobos appears to agree that Enriquez is entitled to file his fourth amended petition. He

states on appeal that “after the trial was cancelled the trial court’s [] scheduling order is no longer

effective to prevent Enriquez’s Fourth Amended Petition.” As a result, his petition for a writ of

mandamus requesting that this Court order the trial court to grant him leave to file an amended

petition is moot. Texas Dept. of Family and Protective Services v. N.J., 644 S.W.3d 189, 192 (Tex.

2022) (“A case may become moot at any time . . . .”). 2

                                                CONCLUSION

        For the mentioned reasons, Enriquez does not currently need leave to file an amended

petition. We, therefore, deny Enriquez’s petition for a writ of mandamus as moot.

                                                     YVONNE T. RODRIGUEZ, Chief Justice

April 20, 2023

Before Rodriguez, C.J., Palafox, and Soto, JJ.

2
  Our opinion today addresses only whether Enriquez currently needs leave to file an amended petition. While we find
that he does not, we do not in anyway opine on whether his amended petition is otherwise appropriate under Rule 63
or would survive a dispositive motion.

                                                         3