Houston skyline
HOUSTON — The First Court of Appeals has affirmed a ruling denying the city of Houston immunity from a lawsuit brought over an employee’s automobile collision.
Edson Carrizales Cruz sued the city for negligence following an automobile accident, alleging that a city employee failed to keep a proper lookout, failed to yield the right of way, ran a red light, struck his vehicle, and caused him to sustain serious bodily injuries.
Carrizales invoked the motor-vehicle waiver of governmental immunity in the Texas Tort Claims Act, court records show.
The city moved to dismiss the suit under Rule 91a of the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, arguing in its motion that Carrizales’s allegations concerning its employee being within the scope of his employment at the time of the automobile accident are too conclusory to establish the waiver of its governmental immunity.
The trial court denied the motion and the city appealed, contending Carrizales has alleged insufficient facts to bring him within the TTCA’s motor vehicle waiver of governmental immunity.
The city emphasized that his petition is silent as to its employee’s “manner and purpose at the time of the incident,” such that the employee could have been acting outside the scope of his employment.
“According to the City, application of a presumption that its employee was acting within the scope of his employment impermissibly excuses the plaintiff from his obligation to allege actual facts that plausibly suggest the employee was doing so,” states the First Court’s Oct. 13 opinion. “In this way, the City says, the presumption reverses the burden of proof, requiring it to prove that its governmental immunity remains intact, rather than requiring the plaintiff to establish jurisdiction by pleading a valid waiver of its immunity.
“We disagree.”
Justices found that Carrizales’s factual allegations raise a reasonable inference that the city’s employee was acting in the scope of his employment.
Appeals case No. 01-25-00033-CV
