Court Opinion

ID: 9653452
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 17:46:47.536381+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:59.226968
License: Public Domain

On Motions for Rehearing
Each party in this case has filed a motion for rehearing. The appellant, City of Houston, in its motion has asked that we reform the judgment of this Court so as to render judgment in its behalf on the bond posted by appellee as a condition to the granting of the temporary injunction in its favor.
The trial court required the appellee, who was plaintiff there to post a bond in the amount of $1,000 as a condition to the temporary injunction which we have dissolved. The appellant, in the prayer in its brief, asked that we not only dissolve the temporary injunction, but also that we render judgment in its favor for the face amount of the bond. That request was based upon the second paragraph of Rule 684, Texas Rules of Civil Procedure which paragraph is in the following language:
“Where the temporary restraining order or temporary injunction is .against the State, a municipality, a State agency, or a subdivision of the State in its governmental capacity, and is such that the State, municipality, State agency, or subdivision of the State in its governmental capacity, has no pecuniary interest in the suit and no monetary damages can be shown, the bond shall be allowed in the sum fixed by the judge, and the liability of the applicant shall be for its face amount if the restraining order or temporary injunction shall be dissolved in whole or in part. The discretion of the trial court in fixing the amount of the bond shall be subject to review. Provided that under equitable circumstances and for good cause shown by affidavit or otherwise the court rendering judgment on the bond may allow recovery for less than its full face amount, the action of the court to be subject to review.”
The temporary injunction granted in this case was one from which the City may have sustained monetary damages which can be shown. In the usual situation the purpose of requiring a bond as a con*696dition to the granting of a temporary injunction is to secure the payment to the party against whom the injunction is issued, the amount of the monetary damages which it sustains as a result of the injunction, and costs, in the event the injunction is subsequently held to be wrongfully issued and is dissolved. Bowlen v. Bowlen, Tex.Civ.App., 1 S.W.2d 355, no writ hist. The determination of the amount of those damages, if any, must be made by a proper procedure in a trial court.
The apparent purpose of the second paragraph of Rule 684 is to require the payment of a fixed amount, in the nature of a penalty, only in those situations in which a governmental entity is wrongfully enjoined, but sustains no monetary damage. Such a situation might exist where a city was enjoined from issuing a permit or from enforcing an ordinance.
The record before us does not show whether the City of Houston has or has not sustained any monetary damage because of the issuance of the temporary injunction which we have dissolved. If the City has not sustained such damages, we are of the opinion that the appellee and its surety should not necessarily be held liable for the face amount of the bond. It is obvious that a trial judge would, in determining the amount of the bond given to secure monetary damages, take into consideration an entirely different set of facts than those which he would consider in fixing the amount of a bond payable, in the event of dissolution of the injunction, as a penalty. Rule 684, to provide for this situation, permits the judge rendering the judgment on the bond to render judgment for less than the face amount of the bond if equitable circumstances suggest such action. Thus, the determination of the amount, if any, for which appellee and its surety should be held liable upon its bond is a matter for determination by a trial court and is not a matter for original proceeding in this Court. The trial court’s determination of this matter is, by the language of the rule itself, made subject to review.
The appellee’s motion for rehearing relates to matters of which we have disposed in our original opinion.
Both motions for rehearing are overruled.