Court Opinion

ID: 9665543
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 00:51:05.587728+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:16.542874
License: Public Domain

O’CONNOR, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent from the penultimate paragraph in the majority’s opinion.
In their motion for rehearing, the appellants asked this Court to include in our opinion the statement that “the only reason the Memorial property sale fell through was the lis pendens filed by Jack Lyles, and the only reason the lis pendens was filed was to block the sale.”
The majority does not challenge the statement on the ground that it is not correct. The majority seems to concede that it is correct, and responds with its statement that lis pendens, as part of the judicial process, provides an absolute privilege that bars a suit for damages. I disagree. I agree with Chief Justice Brown who dissented from one of the cases on which the majority relies. Prappas v. Meyerland Community Improvement Ass’n, 795 S.W.2d 794, 799 (Tex.App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 1990, writ denied), and I agree with him that the Dallas Court of Appeals erred in Griffin v. Rowden, 702 S.W.2d 692 (Tex.App.—Dallas 1986, writ ref'd n.r.e.), another of the cases on which the majority relies.
The majority states that the appellants have other avenues of relief. I do not know what those could be.