The Houston [14th] Court of Appeals has affirmed a Galveston County district court’s summary judgment and sanctions order in favor of an insurer in a policy dispute with homeowners.
Steven Burns, Jacqueline Burns, Eric B. Dick, and the Dick Law Firm, PLLC v. Standard Casualty Company (No. 14-24-00172-CV; February 26, 2026) arose from a dispute between homeowners and their insurer over a claim for property damage caused by burst water pipes. The policy included an endorsement for sudden and accidental discharge, eruption, overflow, or release of water or steam from above-ground parts of the plumbing system. The endorsement limited liability to $5,000. The adjuster for the insurer determined that the damage was caused by three frozen pipes located in the attic of the home and that coverage for the loss was limited to $5,000. Homeowners sued, asserting contractual and extracontractual claims. Defendant filed a motion for traditional and no evidence summary judgment and moved for recovery of attorney’s fees and costs. In its motion to recover attorney’s fees, Defendant argued that Plaintiffs’ attorneys should be sanctioned on the basis that the suit was groundless and brought in bad faith or for purposes of harassment. The trial court granted Defendant’s motions for summary judgment and recovery of attorney’s fees and costs. Plaintiffs appealed.
In an opinion by Justice Wise, the court of appeals affirmed as modified. First, Plaintiffs argued that the trial court abused its discretion by denying their motion for leave to file later summary judgment evidence and their motion for reconsideration. The court rejected this argument because Plaintiffs failed to establish good cause for failing to respond within the deadline imposed by TRCP 166a (seven days before the hearing on MSJ). Although Plaintiffs asserted that the failure to respond “was not the result of conscious indifference,” they provided no explanation whatsoever. Such evidence as they wished to submit late was available before the summary judgment hearing, and Plaintiffs gave no rationale for neglecting to produce it in a timely fashion. The court thus held that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by refusing to countenance the delay.
Next, the court considered Plaintiffs’ contention that the trial court abused its discretion when it struck their summary judgment evidence. As the court pointed out, they didn’t brief the issue. Moreover, SCOTX’s recent opinion in Borusan Mannesmann Pipe US, Inc. v. Hunting Energy Services, LLC, 716 S.W.3d 572 (Tex. 2025) didn’t let them off the hook because, unlike in Borusan, Plaintiffs’ briefing wasn’t adequate to preserve the issue, much less warrant “an additional bite at the briefing apple.” Had the court allowed the Plaintiffs to file a supplemental brief in this case, it “would require this court to step into the shows of appellants’ counsel and formulate an argument explaining why the trial court abused its discretion.” The court understandably declined to do that.
Turning to the motion for traditional summary judgment, the court first looked to the language of the policy to determine whether Plaintiffs raised a genuine fact issue of material fact on their breach of contract claim. Plaintiffs argued that the policy’s coverage for an “explosion” covered the burst pipes, in addition to the specific coverage for sudden plumbing failures. Considered together, the general coverage for “explosions” and the specific coverage for burst pipes made it clear that the plan language of the policy distinguished the two events. Even if the two policy provisions conflicted, the specific would still control over the general, so Plaintiffs’ interpretation of the policy could not be reasonable either way. Defendant fully complied with the policy when it paid $5,000 for damage caused by the burst pipes, so the trial court properly granted summary judgment on the breach of contract claim.
Moving on to the extracontractual claims, the court’s ruling that Defendant proved conclusively that the policy did not give Plaintiffs the right to additional benefits beyond the $5,000 payment, Plaintiffs could not maintain their Chapter 541 claims. The trial court did not err here, either. Plaintiffs likewise failed to produce any evidence supporting their claims for breach of the duty of good faith and fair dealing, fraud, and civil conspiracy. Plaintiffs thus struck out on each of their theories.
As for the sanctions issue, the court observed that the trial court imposed sanctions based on several grounds: TRCP 13; § 541.153, Insurance Code; § 10.001, CPRC; § 17.50(c), and Business & Commerce Code (DTPA). But in their argument, Plaintiffs only addressed Rule 13, not “all independent grounds supporting the judgment or legal conclusion under attack.” In Akhtar v. Leawood HOA, Inc., 525 S.W.3d 814, 819 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2017, no pet.), the court held that “an appellant’s failure to challenge an independent basis for a trial court’s sanctions order rendered harmless the errors, if any, alleged in their challenge of the order.” Since they didn’t challenge the sanctions order under Chapter 10, CPRC, an “independent basis” for the order, any alleged error in the order was rendered harmless. The sanctions stood.
Finally, Plaintiffs challenged the sufficiency of evidence supporting the trial and appellate attorney’s fees award. But since there was no reporter’s record from the hearing on the motion to recover those fees, Plaintiffs couldn’t show error. In the absence of a complete record, the court “must presume the evidence at the hearing supported the trial court’s decision on attorney’s fees” (citations omitted). As to the award of appellate attorney’s fees, the trial court didn’t condition the award of those fees on a successful appeal. Ordinarily that would render the award improper, but appellate courts “may modify a judgment to make the award of appellate attorneys’ fees contingent upon the receiving party’s success on appeal” (citation omitted). In this case the trial court’s error was harmless, since Defendant prevailed in the appeal. The court modified the judgment accordingly, with the proviso that if Plaintiffs appealed to SCOTX, the award would only take effect if Defendant once more succeeded.
