Court Opinion

ID: 9770757
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 16:20:50.622074+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:20.493548
License: Public Domain

CORNELIUS, Chief Justice,
dissenting.
I do not agree that Ms. Stoneman was guilty of sanctionable conduct in this matter.
Appellees do not even contend that Ms. Stoneman violated any express provisions of the rules; in effect, they contend that she violated the “spirit” of the rules by filing a “fraudulent suit” she agreed to later dismiss, in order to secure discovery matters to use in the same legal dispute, but in a different forum.
Although I have always believed that every citizen, and especially lawyers, should obey the spirit of the laws and the rules, the “spirit of a rule” is too ambiguous and too ethereal a standard on which to base punitive sanctions. It is axiomatic that in our legal system punitive statutes or rules must be explicit, and the party punished must be proven to have violated the explicit language of the applicable statute or rule.
It is undisputed in this record that Ms. Stoneman acted in a good-faith belief that she had a legal right to do what she did. Although the majority holds that her actions violated the rules, she should not be punished for her good-faith interpretation of the law simply because her interpretation turned out to be erroneous.
Ms. Stoneman at least had an arguable right to use the procedure she followed. Our rules provide that a party has an absolute right to dismiss her case or take a nonsuit at any time before she has introduced all of her evidence. Tex.R. Civ. P. 162. There is no *891evidence that her claims were groundless; that she acted in bad faith or for the purpose of harassment; that she filed any pleading that was false; that she filed the suit as an experiment to get an opinion of the court; or that the suit was filed for delay. There was no contumacious conduct or disobedience of court orders. She had a genuine justiciable controversy she was seeking to resolve. She simply decided to resolve that controversy in a different quasi-judicial forum favored by our law and public policy, and to use the judicial process as an adjunct to the resolution of her dispute in that forum. She did not conceal facts from the trial court or mislead the court. She fully revealed her acts and her purposes at the first hearing held on the matter.
In hindsight, one might conclude that Ms. Stoneman’s actions were improper. But she had an arguable right to seek redress, and she sought it in good faith. There was and is no legal authority holding that Ms.- Stone-man’s procedure constituted sanctionable conduct. This court has been unable to agree on the legality of her conduct. We should not expect a greater degree of clairvoyance on the part of a lawyer who is required daily to guess how the courts will rule when the legality of the action is questionable.
Sanctions must fit the offense, must be just, and must not be excessive. Trans-American Natural Gas Co. v. Powell, 811 S.W.2d 913 (Tex.1991). I would hold that the trial court abused its discretion in assessing sanctions in these circumstances.