The Beaumont Court of Appeals has reversed a Jefferson County district court’s judgment finding TxDOT liable to an injured plaintiff under the Texas Tort Claims Act.
Texas Department of Transportation v. Oscar Camarillo (No. 99-24-00180-CV; March 19, 2026) arose from a traffic accident on I-10 in Beaumont. Plaintiff, an off-duty DPS trooper, lost control of his motorcycle when exiting the interstate. He sued TxDOT, alleging negligence. He alleged that TxDOT controlled the roadway, the road was worn away and uneven (it had a large pothole), the condition of the road constituted a special or premises defect, and that TxDOT had actual and constructive knowledge of the unreasonably dangerous condition. He further alleged that TxDOT failed to inspect, repair, and maintain the roadway and to use ordinary care either to warn motorists or make the condition reasonably safe. TxDOT asserted sovereign immunity and official immunity under the TTCA. A jury found both parties negligent but assigned 75% of responsibility to TxDOT. The trial court entered a judgment for $250,000 (the statutory cap) plus post-judgment interest. TxDOT appealed.
In an opinion by Justice Johnson, the court of appeals reversed and rendered. The first issue was whether the condition of the road constituted a special defect. As the court observed, this “is a question of duty involving statutory interpretation and thus a matter of law for the court to decide” (citation omitted). TxDOT pointed to a line of authority holding that a “pothole is not a special defect because of its common size and because it is not unusual or unexpected.” TxDOT further argued that Plaintiff, who rode a motorcycle, couldn’t assert that the condition was safe for automobiles but unreasonably dangerous to a different class of driver. Plaintiff responded that in addition to the pothole, the roadway had developed a joint that caused a drop-off from level to the other.
As the court noted, the TTCA provides for a limited waiver of immunity for premises defects and special defects. If the claim involves a premises defect, the governmental unit owes a duty to the claimant as a private person to a licensee on private property. This requires that Plaintiff show the unit had actual knowledge of a condition creating an unreasonable risk of harm and that Plaintiff had no actual knowledge of it. For special defects, the standard is tied to the premises owner’s duty to an invitee. This involves a “known or should have known” standard, followed by an adequate warning or measures to make the condition reasonably safe. (citations omitted). Citing its own authority, the court stated that a special defect is like an “excavation” or “obstruction,” something outside “the ordinary course of events.” SCOTX has provided a multi-factor test to determine the question, and numerous appellate decision have held that most potholes don’t fit the description of an obstruction or excavation. In any event, determination of the issue “turns on the objective expectations of an ‘ordinary user’ who follows the ‘normal course of travel’” (citations omitted).
Applying authority to the facts, the court started with Plaintiff’s allegation that both the pothole and the joint created a special defect. But photographs of the roadway showing them did not themselves “reveal a special defect…. The photographs here show a joint with a small increase in elevation from asphalt on one side of the lane and a shallow pothole on the other side of the lane.” But was that condition “unexpected and unusual” enough to “physically impair an ordinary user’s ability to travel on the road”? Plaintiff did not see what he hit, but he did testify that he had passed over that “bump” in the road numerous times while on patrol. A witness likewise knew about the bump and generally slowed down when she took the exit. The DPS officer who filled out the accident report had also hit the bump in his patrol car, but nothing happened. The witnesses agreed that the pothole was 2” or 3” inches deep, and no calls had come into DPS or local police about it. The court took all this to mean that a shallow pothole is not a special defect but is commonly encountered by ordinary users of roadways. Nor was the joint a special defect for the same reason because “[g]enerally, road bumps and rises in the pavement have not been considered special defects” (citations omitted).
Even when considered together, the pothole and joint did not amount to a special defect. “We cannot say,” concluded the court, “that such condition should be included within the same kind of class as an excavation or obstruction that qualifies as a special defect.” TxDOT’s immunity was not waived. The court reversed the trial court and rendered a take-nothing judgment against Plaintiff.
