Court Opinion

ID: 9653567
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 17:48:59.905564+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:00.043697
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing by Appellants Kress and Rouse
Appellants say that we are in error in holding that Mr. and Mrs. Martens were purchasers pendente lite. They bought after the lis pendens notice was filed but before their vendors, Kress and Rouse, had been served with process. They cite Houston Chronicle Publishing Company v. Bergman, Tex.Civ.App., 128 S.W.2d 114 (Gal.C.C.A., writ dism., C.J.), Barker v. Temple Lumber Co., 120 Tex. 244, 37 S.W.2d 721 and Gulf Oil Corp. v. State, Tex.Civ.App., 170 S.W.2d 798 (El Paso, C.C.A., no writ).
These cases were decided subsequent to 1927 when Article 6643, V.A.C.S., was amended to read:
“All such notices of pendency1 shall be notice to all the world of their contents and that the suit or suits mentioned therein are pending, and such notices shall operate as soon as filed with the county clerk for record, as provided in this Chapter whether service has been had on the parties to said suit or not.”
The provision that the notice was to be effective regardless of service was not in the former statute.
None of the cases cited by appellants refer to this Article.
The Barker case involved the effect of a deed made two days after a suit was filed on September 3, 1890. This was even before the original enactment of a lis pendens statute in 1905.
The Chronicle case involved the effect of a judgment in a trespass to try title case where “No lis pendens notice was ever filed in connection with such trespass to try title action”. [128 S.W.2d 115.]
The Gulf case was a venue suit in which the question was whether a certain suit was “pending” when an amendatory law became effective. The Court said [170 S.W.2d 800]:
“Numerous authorities are cited sustaining the proposition that within the meaning of the lis pendens law, a suit is not regarded as pending until jurisdiction over the defendant has been obtained. Sustaining this perfectly sound proposition, numerous authorities are cited. 28 Tex.Jur. 325-326; Houston Chronicle Pub. Co. v. Bergman, Tex. Civ.App., 128 S.W.2d 114, writ dismissed.
“So widely variant is the purpose of a venue law and the law as to lis pen-dens, we think an analogy is not presented.”
*251We do not believe that it can be fairly said that any of these cases failed to apply or misapplied Article 6643 or that they conflict with our decision here.
In any event we apply Article 6643 and hold the Martens to be purchasers pendente lite even though their vendors had not been served with process in this suit when the sale was made.
The motion is overruled.

. Lis pendens notice provided for in Art. 6640, V.A.C.S.