Sharon Keller's Done a Lot of Stuff and She's Doing a Lot of Stuff

Three seats on Texas's Court of Criminal Appeals will be contested in the fall. With the shriveling up of newspapers and fair-minded, even-handed news coverage on the internet, we're going to post information about all of the candidates.

Presiding Judge Sharon Keller runs for re-election. She grew up in Dallas, went to undergraduate school in Houston at Rice University taking a degree in philosophy. After that, she went to Southern Methodist University in Dallas and took a Juris Doctorate at Southern Methodist University. She worked for another attorney at first. Later she was a solo and spent some time working in her parents' family business. She got appointed for many criminal appeals and ended up an appellate prosecutor in the Dallas County District Attorney's office. She ran as a Republican before being a Republican was cool and won a seat on the bench in 1994. In 2000, she was elected Presiding Judge, and was reelected in 2006 and 2012. She has gotten through this most recent term without the challenges of her past troubles.
She is the candidate of experience in this race. The Presiding Judge is not only the senior jurist of the nine jurists, but she is the administrator of the court with its sizable budget and dozens of staffers. By virtue of her office she is the vice-chair of the Texas Judicial Council, the policymaking body for the Texas judiciary. She is the chair of the Texas Indigent Defense Commission. They grant money and develop systems to help with indigent criminal defense. They count the appointment hours private defenders of indigents serve, finance continuing legal education for indigent defenders, developed a way for indigent west Texas capital defendants to have a measure of choice in who their lawyers were, among other good works. She's also on the board of the Council of State Governments Justice Center which develop and popularize innovative law enforcement, judicial, and corrections policies. Although she chooses half of the members of Texas Department of Criminal Justice Judicial Advisory Council, and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Texas chooses the other half. Chief Justice Hecht chose Presiding Judge Keller as a member.
Presiding Judge Keller said that she enjoyed the "extra-curricular" (ceremonial) parts of her  job very much and didn't think, when she started the job, that she would enjoy that part so much.
She has only one opponent for the Republican nomination, David Bridges of the Texas Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas. There is only one Democrat seeking the nomination of that party, Maria T. ("Terri") Jackson, judge of Houston's 339th Judicial District Court; her husband recently had cancer surgery. About Ms. Jackson, more in March.

Texas Supreme Court and Court of Criminal Appeals Clarify Texas Rule of Appellate Procedure 33.1

The Texas high courts say this rewording is intended only to clarify, and not to change, existing law. They say it's been in force since July 1, 2017. The new part is in bold; the old in regular Roman.
33.1. Preservation; How Shown
(a) In General. As a prerequisite to presenting a complaint for appellate review, the record must show that:
(1) the complaint was made to the trial court by a timely request, objection, or motion that:
(A) stated the grounds for the ruling that the complaining party sought from the trial court with sufficient specificity to make the trial court aware of the complaint, unless the specific grounds were apparent from the context; and
(B) complied with the requirements of the Texas Rules of Evidence or the Texas Rules of Civil or Appellate Procedure; and

(2) the trial court:
(A) ruled on the request, objection, or motion, either expressly or implicitly; or
(B) refused to rule on the request, objection, or motion, and the complaining party objected to the refusal.

(b) Ruling by Operation of Law. In a civil case, the overruling by operation of law of a motion for new trial or a motion to modify the judgment preserves for appellate review a complaint properly made in the motion, unless taking evidence was necessary to properly present the complaint in the trial court.

(c) Formal Exception and Separate Order Not Required. Neither a formal exception to a trial court ruling or order nor a signed, separate order is required to preserve a complaint for appeal.


(d) Sufficiency of Evidence Complaints in Civil Nonjury Cases. In a civil nonjury case, a complaint regarding the legal or factual insufficiency of the evidence— including a complaint that the damages found by the court are excessive or inadequate, as distinguished from a complaint that the trial court erred in refusing to amend a fact finding or to make an additional finding of fact—may be made for the first time on appeal in the complaining party’s brief.

Texas Rule of Appellate Procedure 4.6 Did Not Go into Force Friday, September 1, 2017

In the last issue of the Texas Bar Journal-- August 2017, the Texas Supreme Court and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, promulgated Texas Rule of Appellate Procedure 4.6 as a rule that would go into effect last Friday, Sept. 1, 2017. The weekend's new September 2017 issue withdraws those notices so that there can be more public comment (I bet the prosecutors didn't like one or more things about it.).

Here is the proposed new T.R.A.P. 4.6.
No Notice of Trial Court’s Order on Motion for Forensic DNA Testing
     (a) Additional Time to File Notice of Appeal. Notwithstanding Rules 26.2 and 26.3, a defendant may move for additional time to file a notice of appeal under Code of Criminal Procedure chapter 64 (Motion for Forensic DNA Testing) if the defendant neither received notice nor acquired actual knowledge that the trial judge signed an appealable order before the time for filing a notice of appeal had expired.
     (b) Contents of Motion for Additional Time. The motion must be in writing and sworn, state the earliest date when the defendant first received notice or acquired actual knowledge that the appealable order had been signed, and comply with Rule 10.5(b)(2).
     (c) When and Where to File.
          (1) The motion must be filed within 30 days of the date upon which the defendant first received notice or acquired actual knowledge of the trial court’s signing of the appealable order. But in no event may the motion be filed more than120 days after the date the appealable order was signed.
          (2) The motion must be filed in the proper court of appeals.
     (d) Order of the Court. The court of appeals must grant a motion for additional time if it finds that the defendant neither received notice nor acquired actual knowledge of the trial judge’s signing of an appealable order before the time for filing a notice of appeal had expired and that the defendant timely filed the motion for additional time. The time for filing the document will begin to run on the date when the court grants the motion.

Texas Court System's Adaptation to and Beaumont's Ninth Court of Appeals's Closing for Tropical Storm Harvey

Texas's Supreme Court and Court of Criminal Appeals have encouraged state courts to be lenient with people suffering delays because of Harvey-- more than a few people are trapped in their homes and won't be able to get out for days.  Beaumont's Ninth Court of Appeals's appears to have closed Friday, August 25, 2017 at five PM and will not open until further notice.

Do Not Lose Your Mind While Seeking Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law in Texas

This is about appealing a Texas state bench trial. The fact-finding judge does not need a jury charge (Though I confess I make one up when practical. It'll tell me what kind of findings the appeals court will likely expect the side with the burden of proof to have proven.).

I start with practical experience.

1. Usually the trial judge asks the party who is going to be the appellant to draft proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law. If something is found wrong with the findings and conclusions, the party that's going to suffer is the winner at trial. The trial judge may change them greatly, but at least gets to edit someone else's first draft instead of starting from scratch.

2.    They're called findings of fact and conclusions of law. But conclusions of law.as compared to findings of fact are trivial. Conclusions of law, are, at least in part, redundant with the judgment. I've even seen judges propose and sign findings of fact and make no conclusions of law at all.

3. There is nothing illegal or improper for the loser at trial to file their own proposed FoF & CoL. In extremely rare cases the trial judge has been so impressed by the loser's FoF & CoL, that the judge switches sides as to the judgment.

Findings of fact and conclusions of law have to be requested within 20 days after a final judgment is signed. But there's more.If the court fails to file timely findings of fact and conclusions of law, the party making the request shall, within thirty days after filing the original request, file with the clerk and serve on all other parties in accordance with Rule 21a a "Notice of Past Due Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law" which shall be immediately called to the attention of the court by the clerk. Such notice shall state the date the original request was filed and the date the findings and conclusions were due.Upon filing this notice, the time for the court to file findings of fact and conclusions of law is extended to forty days from the date the original request was filed.

SO ASKING ONCE TIMELY FOR FoF and CoL IS NOT ENOUGH. YOU HAVE TO ASK TIMELY TWICE.

The parties can ask for specified or amended within ten days, If trial court is not sea No findings or conclusions shall be deemed or presumed by any failure of the court to make any additional findings or conclusions.

In a Texas state criminal case, an appeals court may order a trial judge for file FoF and CoL notwithstanding  what the parties did about these points. Cf. Tex. R. App. P. 34.5 (c) (2).

Should the CCA Apply a Standard Currently Being Reviewed by SCOTUS?

Today's case is Us Carnell Petetan, Jr. v. State of Texas, ____ S.W.3d _____, No. AP-77,038, (Tex. Crim. App. Mar. 8, 2017). Petetan was convicted and sentenced to death in the 19th Judicial District in Waco. A CCA appeal is automatic.
The Court's opinion was written by Presiding Judge Sharon Keller and joined by all the judges except Judge Elsa Alcala, who wrote a dissent on a single issue-- that Petetan's automatic appeal as to whether or not he had too low an I.Q. to be executed was not ripe for decision, because Moore v. Texas No. 15-797 (pet. granted June 6, 2016, argued Nov. 29, 2016).had been accepted by the Supreme Court of the United States and argued as to whether Texas’s legal standard for determining intellectual disability violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against the execution of intellectually disabled people. She said that SCOTUS's decisions in Atkins v. Virginia 536 U.S. 304 (2002) and Hall v. Florida, 134 S. Ct. 1986 (2014) signal that any assessment of intellectual disability must be informed by, and cannot be untethered from, the current medical diagnostic framework for assessing intellectual disability, but this Court’s standard in Ex parte Briseno, 135 S.W.3d 1, 4-5 (Tex. Crim. App. 2004). has strayed from that requirement.
The majority held that that there was sufficient evidence to find that Petetan intentionally killed his wife while he was kidnapping his wife and her daughter.

How should Texas Constitution, Article I, Section 11b Be Read with Federal Due Process Standard?

Ex parte Heath Shires, No. 02-16-00348-CR, (Dec. 29, 2016), a ruling on a pre-trial writ of habeas corpus by Fort Worth's Second Court of Appeals, seems to me to be a good candidate to get to the Court of Criminal Appeals. The appellate panel is all-female: Justice Lee Ann Dauphinot, Justice Lee Gabriel, and Justice Bonnie Sudderth. Justice Sudderth writes the majority opinion. Justice Dauphinot dissented.
Shires is indicted on four sex offenses against a minor October 14, 2014. Two of his bail conditions are that he is not supposed to drink alcohol nor is he supposed to commit another offense. He is arrested for felony DWI September 4, 2016. Two of his bond conditions are that he is not supposed to drink alcohol and that he is not supposed to drive any vehicle that does not have an alcohol interlock. On September 6, 2016, State says Shires's bond for the four earlier offenses is too low. 
There was a hearing on raising the bond amount on the old charges Sept. 6, 2016. the parties stipulated that Shires had violated the bond conditions, but Shires argued that his bond should not be revoked, but that an alcohol monitor should have been attached to him. He also argued that Tex. Const. art. I, sec 11b, violated the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The trial court rejected the challenge and allowed the hearing on it to make a record for the habeas writ. 
Shires challenges sec 11b's federal constitutionality as applied to him. The majority rejects Shires's claim that federal precedent required that every trial court to apply a clear and convincing evidence standard, nor requires each trial court to consider
if additional bond conditions may adequately assure the safety of the community
or the victim. 
Justice Dauphinot submitted that 11b had to be applied in light of the federal due process standard, and that the appeals court should have reversed and remanded to the trial court with instructions as to what federal due process precisely required (She appeared to me, to think that Shires, at least in part, had the right idea.
The State has the burden of proving the allegations of its motion. The trial
court must be convinced by the evidence that the State has borne its burden.
The issue is not whether some appellate court can, by speculation and reading
between the lines, cobble together enough possibilities to support the State’s
allegations and to support a determination that the detainee must not be released
under any conditions because no conditions exist that will reasonably protect the
public. The record must reflect evidence from which the trial court can make the
legally mandated determinations, and the trial court must actually make the

necessary determinations.

Justice Dauphinot aged out of her position at the end of 2016 and has had to retire. I can't really imagine her getting that old; she always seemed to me to be younger in spirit than people many years her junior. For what it's worth, I liked her and am going to miss her.

What Happens to Trial Exhibits on Appeal?

In Texas state practice, admitted trial exhibits are attached to the court reporter's record. Where an exhibit is very valuable (e.g. a bearer bond) or dangerous (a firearm) or very bulky (an image as large as a billboard), trial judges will often grant motions for images of exhibits to be substituted for the exhibits themselves.
At the court reporter's request, the trial court clerk must give all original exhibits to the reporter for use in preparing the reporter’s record. Unless ordered to include original exhibits in the reporter’s record, the court reporter must return the original exhibits to the clerk after copying them for inclusion in the reporter’s record. If someone other than the trial court clerk possesses an original exhibit, either the trial court or the appellate court may order that person to deliver the exhibit to the trial court clerk.
 If the trial court determines that original exhibits should be inspected by the appellate court or sent to that court in lieu of copies, the trial court must make an order for the safekeeping, transportation, and return of those exhibits. The order must list the exhibits and briefly describe them. To the extent practicable, all the exhibits must be arranged in their listed order and bound firmly together before being sent to the appellate clerk. On any party's motion or its own initiative, the appellate court may direct the trial court clerk to send it any original exhibit.

Dallas Court of Appeals Justice Resigns in Lieu of Facing Removal Proceedings

David Lewis, a justice on Texas's Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas, resigned just as removal papers were filed against him with the Texas Supreme Court on Tuesday. Lewis suffered from alcoholism and depression and had been suspended without pay since September 2014. According to the records of the Texas Commission for Judicial Conduct quoted in the Dallas News blog of the Dallas Morning News, Lewis was "erratic, hostile and threatening." A doctor chosen by the Judicial Conduct Commission reported that Lewis's problems began as early as 2013 and that a scan of his brain in 2015 is of a person who is experiencing decreased cognitive function and is trying to cover that up.
Governor Abbott will appoint a person to fill Lewis's seat on the bench until his term ends in 2018. Lewis is a Republican. Texas's Fifth Court of Appeals is the state appeals court for Collin, Dallas, Grayson, Hunt, Kaufman, and Rockwall counties.
Hat tip to the Texas Lawyer newspaper's online bulletin.

Texas State Criminal Appellate Court Costs

In a criminal appellate court proceeding, except in cases in which a presumption of indigence has been established as provided by Rule 20.1(a)(3), a petitioner must file an affidavit of indigence in the court in which the proceeding is filed, with or before the document seeking relief. A respondent who requests preparation of a record in connection with an appellate court proceeding must file an affidavit of indigence in the appellate court within 15 days after the date when the respondent requests preparation of the record, except in cases in which a presumption of indigence has been established as provided by Rule 20.1(a)(3).

When written notice of appeal from a judgment or order in a habeas corpus or bail proceeding is filed, the trial court clerk must prepare and certify the clerk’s record and, if the appellant requests, the court reporter must prepare and certify a reporter’s record.[1]

The court may make an appropriate order relating to costs, whether allowing costs and fixing the amount, or allowing no costs.[2]

---

[1] Tex. R. App. P. 31.1

[2] Id.

Cross Appeals

As to Texas civil cases, if any party timely files a notice of appeal, another party may file a notice of appeal within the applicable period stated above or 14 days after the first filed notice of appeal, whichever is later.

The leading Texas criminal case on cross-appeals is Pfeiffer v. State, 363 S.W.3d 594, 599 (Tex. Crim. App. 2012). It taught an appellate court's jurisdiction is invoked by the timely filing of a notice of appeal. And that the proper notice of appeal vests Texas appellate courts with a broad scope of review and revision over a criminal case. Once jurisdiction of an appellate court is invoked, exercise of its reviewing functions is limited only by its own discretion or a valid restrictive statute. For example, appellate courts may review unassigned error—a claim that was preserved in the trial court but was not raised by either party on appeal. Pfeiffer quoted Carter v. State, 656 S.W.2d 468 (Tex. Crim. App. 1983) that quoted an even older case from the Texas republic that there is a fundamental proposition pertaining to appellate functions of the Judicial Department: A constitutional grant of appellate jurisdiction treats a right of appeal in criminal cases ‘as a remedy to revise the whole case upon the law and facts, as exhibited in the record. Thus, when a defendant appeals a conviction, the courts of appeals have the jurisdiction to address any error in that case, including the State. When a defendant appealed his conviction, the entire case was subject to review, and the State could raise its claim of an illegal sentence without filing any notice of appeal.

Texas Indigents Freed from Paying Court Costs in Their Divorces

Poor people should not be oppressed by costs imposed by courts. The federal Justice Department thinks so. As to attorneys' fees for services rendered to paupers, San Antonio's Fourth Court of Appeals agrees. The estimable Jani Maselli Woods believes so. E.g. Peraza v. State, 457 S.W.3d 134, (Tex. App.-- Houston [1st Dist.], Dec. 4, 2014)  reversed at 467 S.W.3d 508, (July 01, 2015).
The Texas Supreme Court joins them as to filing fees for civil suits filed with uncontested pauper's oaths. The case is Campbell v. Wilder, No. 14–0379, 2016 WL 1267876 (Tex., Apr. 1, 2016) (Hecht, C.J.) (slip op.) (Lehrmann, J. not sitting).
Seven people-- Campbell along with six others--  who got divorced for free by filing uncontested affidavits of indigency, also known as pauper's oaths, under Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 145 got cost bills from Tarrant County District Clerk Thomas A. Wilder. Those bills were in amounts around $300 and threatened that if they were not paid, the sheriff would take property in lieu of the money.
The Texas Advocacy Project objected as to some of the plaintiffs. Wilder said he was bound by the decrees saying that each party had to pay their own costs and that the unhappy indigents should return to court and have the cost charges altered.
Plaintiffs sued in Tarrant County's 17th Judicial District Court, which had made none of the divorce decrees for injunctive relief, inter alia.  After a hearing, it found that the
District Clerk:

" . . . has a policy, practice, and procedure that his office will seek to collect costs against

parties who have filed an affidavit on [sic] indigency under Tex. R. Civ. P. 145 where the

affidavit was not contested, where the contest was denied, or where the contest was

withdrawn based on judgments or final orders in which there was no specific finding

expressly stated in the judgment or final order that the indigent party’s action resulted

in a monetary award, and no specific finding expressly stated in the judgment or final

order that there was sufficient monetary award to reimburse costs[.]"

The Second Court of Appeals, the one in Fort Worth, poured the plaintiffs out for lack of jurisdiction in a divided opinion. The Austin Supremes took it up and some prominent appellate lawyers joined the team for the plaintiffs, e.g. former Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Wallace Jefferson.

The Texas Supremes overruled Evans v. Pringle, 643 S.W.2d 116 (Tex. 1982) (per curiam), holding that the 17th District Court's injunction affecting other trial courts' judgments was allowable.

They also quoted the Tex. R. Civ. P. 145 that the affidavit of indigency was in lieu of costs. That is, once the time for challenging the affidavit of indigency passed-- there were not any costs for that party in the case, and that family courts were freer to assign costs than other civil courts were, made no basis for indigents to incur court costs.

 
Thoughts on this case:

As to indigents lacking liability to pay court fees, this decision appears to comport with the plain language of Rule 145. For a prince of the GOP to ignore the letter of the law to take the property of poor people named Odell, Shaunta, and Tairhonda sickens people with sensitivity, who are also known as swing voters.

A Man of Many Parts, a Man for All Seasons, Heads to the CCA Hustings.

Richard Davis is the Republican challenging Judge Mike Keasler for Place Six on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals is Richard Davis who ran for Place Four to succeed Paul Womack two years ago, only to get nosed out by Kevin Yeary. He tells me that he intends to run a more vigorous campaign than he did two years ago and so far has been endorsed by the Houston Police Officers Union. He says that he is a fan of this blog. An easygoing talker, with a sonorous, beautiful speaking voice, he practices general trial and appellate law in Burnet, Texas, near Austin. He has 32 years of experience. Graduating from Baylor law school started practicing law in Brownsville, then Waco, and then in Odessa before moving to the Austin area where he eventually ended up with the Burnet practice he has today. He was a special prosecutor, then acting Sherman County Attorney in Stratford in the panhandle and worked in Odessa in the Ector County District Attorney's office and then later in the County Attorney's office, and had an appointment as a special prosecutor when he was at the County Attorney's office. He has been a contract public defender in Burnet. Along with a Travis County Assistant District Attorney, Davis did a jury selection training for Baylor. He won a "Best Lawyer in Burnet" award in the local paper. He loves to hunt, but doesn't get as much chance to do it as he would like, and is married to a shy woman. He has recent practical experience on both sides of the docket, and, compared to the other Republican candidates is very much in touch with the challenges of small firm lawyers who make up the great bulk of the defense bar.

Sid Harle, Long Time San Antone Judge with Many Achievements, Runs for CCA Place 5

Sid L. Harle runs for Texas's Court of Criminal Appeals Place Five to replace retiring Judge Cheryl Johnson. He's been judge of the 226th Judicial District Court in San Antonio since 1988. Has been unopposed since 1990. He was formerly the Chair of the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct, which is the kind of job they don't choose chumps for. His background primarily was as a Bexar County Assistant District Attorney, though he had time as a defense lawyer. He has been an adjunct professor at St. Mary's Law School for more than 20 years. He was the judge who supervised the exoneration of Michael Morton, touching Morton and many onlookers with his insistence that enough people had been looking down on Morton long enough, and climbing down from the bench to hand him his exoneration papers. With Red McCombs as a major supporter, his campaign should be well-financed.
Harle is a shy man, who seemed uncomfortable telling me, a stranger, about his accomplishments. The oldest judicial photograph of him here shows a wary man, and each later one shows a man more and more comfortable in his own skin.

Running against Harle as Republicans is Williamson County Assistant District Attorney Brent Webster, somebody named Steve Smith, and another named Scott Walker. A Betsy Walker will run for the Democrats.

The Candidates for Texas's Court of Criminal Appeals

Texas's highest criminal court has three openings this election season.

Texas and Oklahoma are the only U.S. states that have separate highest courts for civil and criminal matters. Texas's Supreme Court only takes civil matters. In Texas, juvenile cases, cases the State brings against young people who are delinquent or in need of supervision go to the Supreme Court, not the Court of Criminal Appeals.

Place Two is presently held by Larry Meyers, who pioneered Republicans' being on the court switched parties last cycle to become the only Democrat holding statewide office in Texas. He runs for reelection as a Democrat. The Republicans vying to challenge him are Houston state District Court judge Mary Lou Keel, Collin County District Judge Mr. Chris Oldner, and Collin County District Judge Ray Wheless. Collin County, county seat McKinney, is a suburban county just north of Dallas, except for the tiny part of Dallas which is in the county.

Cheryl Johnson is retiring out of Place Five on the Court. Republicans seeking to replace her are: San Antonio District Judge Sid Harle, Williamson County prosecutor Brent Webster, Steve Smith, a successful advocate in Hopwood v. Texas in which the Fifth Circuit struck down reverse racial discrimination at UT-Austin until the United States Supremes reversed it- he also won a partial term as a Texas Supreme Court justice, also a Tarrant County lawyer named Scott Walker is running. Somebody named Betsy Johnson, apparently from San Antonio, has signed up to run as a Democrat.
Judge Michael E. Keasler runs for reelection in Place Six. Richard Davis, the Richard Dean Davis from last cycle is running against him for the nomination. . A Robert Burns, apparently from Dallas, will run as a Democrat.

Possibly Coming Soon to a Texas Criminal Trial Court Clerk Near You- E-filing in Criminal Cases!

Rules governing electronic filing in Texas criminal cases have been finally approved. A clerk may implement criminal case electronic filing in that clerk’s office when that clerk has the written consent of a majority of the judges in the county who have jurisdiction in criminal cases and who are served by that clerk. Appellate courts generally require e-filing for documents filed by attorneys in criminal matters, so these new rules apply to trial courts. Under these rules, e-filing may not be the exclusive manner of filing documents; paper filing must still be allowed (i.e. the kind of filing done presently). Charging instruments cannot be e-filed; they must be paper-filed. Otherwise, the e-filing is similar to that in civil cases, viz. no in camera material, no material under seal or proposed to be under seal, no sensitive information.
New rule 1.04(b) does not appear to be harmonized with Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Annotated section 132.001 (West Supp. 2015). It appears to me that a statute trumps a supreme court administrative rule.

Effective September 1 The Texas Supreme Court Changes Juvenile Certification Appellate Practice

The Texas Supreme Court ordered that juvenile certification appeals be accellerated and that juvenile courts tell a respondent of that person's right to an immediate appeal, effective September 1.  A juvenile court certifying a juvenile to stand trial as an adult must must tell the juvenile and the juvenile's attorney orally on the record in open court and in writing of the right to immediately appeal the certification decision and the accelerated nature of the appeal. As far as reasonably possible, those appeals are to get to final disposition within 180 days.

Texas Bar Litigation Section's Fall 2015 Issue of The Advocate Has Useful, Helpful Articles for Civil Appellate Practitioners.

The Advocate, the publication of the State Bar of Texas Litigation Section, has two outstanding article which should be of interest to followers of this blog: "Permissive Interlocutory Appeals in Texas" by Connie Pfeiffer on page 48 of the Fall 2015 issue and "Which of These Motions Are Appealable" by Jane Webre on page 52.

This Year the University of Texas Updates the Greenbook

Update your Greenbook-- your Texas Rules of Form if you have not- it's up to edition 13.

So You Want to Appeal a Texas State Summary Judgment?

A trial is a determining of controverted facts and law. Usually both sides agree on the law, but don't generally agree on the facts. If the facts of a case are agreed, both sides can submit their view of the law to a judge, and the judge can issue a final judgment. (Why can't one of the sides get a jury?  Because a jury's job is to decide fact disputes. No fact disputes? Then no need for (and no right to) a jury.)
Let's say a lawsuit is filed Lawsuit A-- one side says that a factual dispute exists between the parties about one of the elements of a case  and the other side says that any factual disputes are not about any of the elements of the cause of action. That other side asks for the judge to rule that there are no factual disputes about any of the elements of the case, so that no factual determination is required, just a final decision on the law. If the judge grants the motion that there are no factual disputes in the case. The judge will enter a final judgment which one or the other parties may appeal. In Lawsuit B a judge may grant a summary judgment because a defense is proved as a matter of law such that no trial is needed. In Lawsuit C a state summary judgment that can be granted because-- after a reasonable time for discovery a side propounding a cause of a cause of action or a vital defense have not come up with more than a scintilla of evidence in favor of the element or defense..
There need not be oral hearings as to whether or not a summary judgment motion or similar motion should be granted.
As you recall, generally, judgments can not be appealed unless they are final.
Really good trial judges check the pleadings and interlocutory rulings and nonsuits of all parties and make sure not to close a trial file unless every issue for every party has been adjudged or dismissed. Judges often put in a judgment that they intend to be final and appealable "This is a final judgment," and "All relief not granted is denied." This last sentence is especially clever: any element of the litigation or any party in the litigation that might have been forgotten now has an appealable ruling!
You can imagine that frequently, the party that wanted the trial might want to object or a party to a law dispute may want to appeal the trial court's law ruling.
As in any non-interlocutory appeal, if the lower court's judgment is not final, the higher court lacks jurisdiction over the matter. If the higher court finds that it does not have jurisdiction over your matter then you case is on the fast track to Loserville.
Surprisingly, there is a line of authority that says that determining the finality of a judgment should not be a big deal. That, for example, if a lower court judgment is issued under circumstances that would make a reasonable outsider think that the judgment is supposed to be a final judgment-- that is, at the end of super-comprehensive, but not completely comprehensive, bench trial or jury trial, that even though it left out some early parties who dropped out of the case, though technically some of their causes of action were still pending, evidence of finality is close enough for government work. I know that I am not the only appellate lawyer to think that these cases make bad precedent. If it is not as clear as glass whether or not a court has jurisdiction, we lawyers cannot give reliable advice to our clients, and it opens appellate courts to the appearance of requiring absolute finality for disfavored parties and giving a pass to favored ones.
Practice tip one: if a proposed appeal comes to your desk less than 30 days after the judgment, do what the trial judge should have done in the first place: check the pleadings and interlocutory rulings and nonsuits of all parties and check whether every issue for every party has been adjudged or dismissed. If any have been left out, consider a motion for a trial on those issues or a motion to dismiss those issues, or even a motion for summary judgment. Consider this even if the judgment proposed to be appealed is old, even very old. Remember, generally, the appellate deadlines do not begin to run until there is a final judgment, and if a suitable judge or panel rule that the judgment is not final, the clock has not begun to run at all. 
 It is highly unlikely that any harmful error will be found nor any appellate relief granted unless the appellant made it clear in a timely written response to the motion for summary judgment what the error. If the motion for summary judgment is unclear, special exceptions must be filed to the motion. In response to the special exceptions for the motion, the judge may give the summary judgment movant a chance to replead.  Sometimes the movant repleads, and the respondent specially excepts to mistakes that were not fixed. A motion will generally be dismissed only if repeated efforts fail to produce understandable and reasonably complete motion points fail.