Court Opinion

ID: 9668486
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 02:16:22.846707+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:45.645255
License: Public Domain

STOREY, Justice,
concurring.
I concur in the result reached by the majority. However, I believe the law with respect to the principle of res judicata is settled by the Supreme Court’s holding in Abbott Laboratories v. Gravis, 470 S.W.2d 639 (Tex.1971), as reaffirmed in Griffin v. Holiday Inns of America, 496 S.W.2d 535 (Tex.1973). The law as announced in Gra-vis is grounded upon sound policy factors, in cases where the evidence to be presented in the two actions is not precisely the same. It affords as great a degree of certainty in this somewhat nebulous area of the law as can be found, while at the same time avoiding the harsh result often brought about by deciding these cases by mechanical definition.
Here, the majority has, I believe, applied relevant policy factors in this case as it is required to do under Gravis. Having done so, the case becomes simple of decision. The question is merely whether the “cause of action” in this contract case is so substantially similar to the prior negligence case that the issues in this case “should have been brought” in the prior case. I conclude that the causes of action are not so substantially similar as to require us to hold the second case precluded by the first, and therefore concur.