TEXAS MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY, PETITIONER, v. BERTILA CHICAS, INDIVIDUALLY AND AS BENEFICIARY OF SANTIAGO CHICAS, DECEASED, RESPONDENT
No. 17-0501
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF TEXAS
April 5, 2019
Argued January 22, 2019
JUSTICE
JUSTICE BUSBY did not participate in the decision.
In this case we consider whether the 45-day deadline to seek judicial review of a decision by a Division of Workers’ Compensation appeals panel is jurisdictional. The trial court granted a defendant‘s plea to the jurisdiction and dismissed a judicial-review claim that had been filed after the 45-day deadline. The court of appeals reversed, holding that while the 45-day deadline is mandatory, it is not jurisdictional. For the reasons below, we agree with the court of appeals and affirm.
I
On March 17, 2012, Santiago Chicas was doing yard work at the home of Peyton Waters, Jr., when he fell from a ladder and sustained fatal injuries. Waters was the majority owner of Spartan Equipment and Supply, Inc., where Santiago was employed. Santiago‘s wife, Bertila Chicas (Chicas), sought workers’ compensation benefits from Spartan Equipment‘s insurer, Texas Mutual Insurance Company. After Texas Mutual disputed the claim, Chicas initiated administrative proceedings to resolve the issue at the Texas Department of Insurance, Division of Workers’ Compensation.
During the administrative proceedings, a hearing officer concluded after a contested-case hearing that Santiago was not an employee of Spartan Equipment at the time of his injury and therefore his injury was not compensable. Chicas appealed the hearing officer‘s determinations to an appeals panel. On January 5, 2015, the Division notified Chicas that after review by the panel, the hearing officer‘s decision and order was final. The notice also stated, consistent with
Meanwhile, while the administrative proceedings were still pending, Chicas had filed a wrongful-death suit in probate court against Spartan Equipment and others. On February 4, 2015, well within the 45-day deadline to seek review of the appeals-panel decision, Chicas amended her probate-court pleadings to add Texas Mutual as a defendant, seeking judicial review of the administrative decision. Six months later, Texas Mutual filed a plea to the jurisdiction and argued that the probate court could not exercise jurisdiction over a judicial review that had no relationship to the
Twelve days after the probate court dismissed her claims, Chicas again filed suit against Texas Mutual but in district court, “seek[ing] judicial review of the Appeals Panel Decision.” Texas Mutual filed another plea to the jurisdiction, asserting (1) that the 45-day deadline to seek judicial review of an appeals-panel decision is jurisdictional and (2) because Chicas filed suit in the district court after the deadline had passed, that court lacked jurisdiction. The district court granted Texas Mutual‘s plea to the jurisdiction and dismissed Chicas‘s claims against it in their entirety.
Chicas appealed. The court of appeals reversed, holding that the 45-day deadline for filing judicial-review claims in
II
A
The parties agree the 45-day deadline to seek judicial review of an appeals-panel decision is mandatory, but “just because a statutory requirement is mandatory does not mean that compliance with it is jurisdictional.” Id. at 395 (quoting Albertson‘s, Inc. v. Sinclair, 984 S.W.2d 958, 961 (Tex. 1999)). Nearly a century ago, we held that where a cause of action is derived from a statute, including a suit challenging a workers’ compensation award, “strict compliance with all statutory prerequisites is necessary to vest a trial court with jurisdiction.” Prairie View A & M Univ. v. Chatha, 381 S.W.3d 500, 510 (Tex. 2012) (citing Mingus v. Wadley, 285 S.W. 1084, 1087 (Tex. 1926)). This remained the law for decades and, consistent with Mingus, multiple courts of appeals treated the statutory deadline for seeking judicial review of an appeals-panel decision as mandatory and jurisdictional. See, e.g., Tex. Workers’ Comp. Comm‘n v. Hartford Accident & Indem. Co., 952 S.W.2d 949, 952 (Tex. App.—Corpus Christi–Edinburg 1997, pet. denied); Adkins v. Ector Cty. Indep. Sch. Dist., 969 S.W.2d 142, 143 (Tex. App.—El Paso 1998), pet. denied, 989 S.W.2d 363 (Tex. 1999) (per curiam); Morales v. Emp‘rs Cas. Co., 897 S.W.2d 866, 868 (Tex. App.—San Antonio 1995, writ denied).
But in Dubai Petroleum Co. v. Kazi, 12 S.W.3d 71, 76 (Tex. 2000), we identified concerns with the approach to subject-matter jurisdiction that we set out in Mingus. We recognized that although Mingus was consistent with the dominant approach at the time it was decided, “the modern direction of policy is to reduce the vulnerability of final judgments to attack on the ground that the tribunal lacked subject matter jurisdiction.” Id. at 76 (quoting RESTATEMENT (SECOND) OF JUDGMENTS § 11 cmt. e, at 113 (1982)). We overruled Mingus “to the extent that it characterized the plaintiff‘s failure to establish a statutory prerequisite as jurisdictional.” Id.
As the court of appeals in this case noted, after Dubai and USAA, some courts of appeals continued to hold that the 45-day deadline to file suit under
Turning to the statutory requirement in this case, we presume the Legislature did not intend the 45-day filing deadline to be jurisdictional, but “[t]o determine whether a statutory requirement is jurisdictional, we apply statutory interpretation principles.” City of DeSoto, 288 S.W.3d at 394. We may consider: (1) the plain meaning of the statute, (2) whether the statute contains specific consequences for noncompliance, (3) the purpose of the statute, and (4) the consequences that would result from each construction. Crosstex Energy Servs., L.P. v. Pro Plus, Inc., 430 S.W.3d 384, 392 (Tex. 2014) (citing City of DeSoto, 288 S.W.3d at 395; Helena Chem. Co. v. Wilkins, 47 S.W.3d 486, 495 (Tex. 2001)). Looking to the statutory language, it provides:
Time for Filing Petition; Venue
(a) A party may seek judicial review by filing suit not later than the 45th day after the date on which the division mailed the party the decision of the appeals panel. For purposes of this section, the mailing date is considered to be the fifth day after the date the decision of the appeals panel was filed with the division.
(b) The party bringing suit to appeal the decision must file a petition with the appropriate court in:
(1) the county where the employee resided at the time of the injury or death, if the employee is deceased . . . .
We agree with the court of appeals that there is no explicit language in this statute that indicates the Legislature clearly intended the 45-day deadline in subsection (a) to be jurisdictional―it does not refer to the trial court‘s jurisdiction in any way. But cf.
Texas Mutual also points to subsections (c) and (d) of
(c) If a suit under this section is filed in a county other than the county described by Subsection (b), the court, on determining that it does not have jurisdiction to render judgment on the merits of the suit, shall transfer the case to a proper court in a county described by Subsection (b). Notice of the transfer of a suit shall be given to the parties. A suit transferred under this subsection shall be considered for all purposes the same as if originally filed in the court to which it is transferred.
(d) If a suit is initially filed within the 45-day period in Subsection (a), and is transferred under Subsection (c), the suit is considered to be timely
filed in the court to which it is transferred.
Again, we disagree. In Morales v. Liberty Mut. Ins. Co., 241 S.W.3d 514, 516 n.1 (Tex. 2007), we noted that although the Legislature provided in subsection (c) that when suit is filed in the wrong county the court may determine that it “does not have jurisdiction,” the Legislature clearly did not mean subject-matter jurisdiction because it provided for transfer as a remedy rather than dismissal. If the Legislature did not intend for the requirement regarding where suit is to be filed to be jurisdictional, we do not see clear legislative intent for the requirement regarding when suit is to be filed to be jurisdictional.
Further, the lack of a savings clause in
We next consider the purpose of the statute. Texas Mutual points to the purposes of the Workers’ Compensation Act―to provide prompt resolution of disputes and payment of benefits and “speed up the time for the entire dispute resolution process.” See Tex. Mut. Ins. Co. v. Ruttiger, 381 S.W.3d 430, 440 (Tex. 2012). Chicas points to the Act‘s purpose of “compensating injured workers and their dependents.” See Albertson‘s, Inc., 984 S.W.2d at 961. Treating the deadline in
Next, we consider the consequences that result from each construction. If the 45-day deadline is jurisdictional, this would leave final judgments vulnerable to attack on the ground that the deadline was not met. “It is preferable to ‘avoid a result that leaves the decisions and judgments of [a tribunal] in limbo and subject to future attack, unless that was the Legislature‘s clear intent.‘” USAA, 307 S.W.3d at 310 (quoting City of DeSoto, 288 S.W.3d at 394). Texas Mutual asserts that if the deadline is not jurisdictional and the tolling provision in the Civil Practice and Remedies Code is applied to judicial-review
In addition to the above factors, Texas Mutual also urges us to consider “whether the statute defines and restricts the class of cases a district court may hear.” This factor was addressed in Sierra Club v. Tex. Nat. Res. Conservation Comm‘n, 26 S.W.3d 684, 688 (Tex. App.—Austin 2000), aff‘d on other grounds, 70 S.W.3d 809 (Tex. 2002), in which the court of appeals concluded that because the statutes at issue did not “define, enlarge, or restrict the class of causes the court may decide or the relief that may be awarded,” a failure to comply with the statutory requirements was not jurisdictional. Id. Other courts of appeals, including the court in this case, have followed Sierra Club and recognized this as a consideration when determining whether a statutory requirement is jurisdictional. 522 S.W.3d at 72; see, e.g., Heart Hosp. IV, L.P. v. King, 116 S.W.3d 831, 838 (Tex. App.—Austin 2003, pet. denied); Tex. Dep‘t of Transp. v. Beckner, 74 S.W.3d 98, 103 (Tex. App.—Waco 2002, no pet.). However, we decline to consider factors other than those set out in our precedent. See Crosstex Energy, 430 S.W.3d at 392 (citing City of DeSoto, 288 S.W.3d at 395; Helena Chem., 47 S.W.3d at 495).
Finally, Texas Mutual also claims that the deadline is jurisdictional because it is an integral element of the Legislature‘s carefully crafted workers’ compensation dispute-resolution system. We have consistently recognized the workers’ compensation system as a “comprehensive statutory scheme.” Liberty Mut. Ins. Co. v. Adcock, 412 S.W.3d 492, 493 (Tex. 2013); see In re Accident Fund Gen. Ins. Co., 543 S.W.3d 750, 752 (Tex. 2017) (per curiam) (“The Workers’ Compensation Act ‘provides the exclusive procedures and remedies for claims alleging that a workers’ compensation carrier has improperly investigated, handled, or settled a workers’ claim for benefits.‘” (quoting In re Crawford & Co., 458 S.W.3d 920, 923–24 (Tex. 2015))). Texas Mutual claims that the Legislature‘s clear intent to define the boundaries of the workers’ compensation dispute-resolution process indicates that the filing deadline is jurisdictional because it shows an intent to circumscribe judicial-review jurisdiction. But our considerations above take into account the context of the deadline at issue and encompass the Legislature‘s intent as reflected in the Act. The Legislature has set out multiple specific requirements in the Act. See, e.g.,
We conclude that the 45-day deadline to seek review from an appeals-panel decision in
B
Next, Texas Mutual asserts that the court of appeals incorrectly held that the filing deadline in
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The 45-day deadline to file suit for judicial review of an appeals-panel decision in
Jeffrey V. Brown
Justice
OPINION DELIVERED: April 5, 2019