Willis Floyd Wiley v. American Zurich Insurance Company ( 2014 )

Opinion issued January 16, 2014
In The
Court of Appeals
For The
First District of Texas
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NO. 01-13-00345-CV
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WILLIS FLOYD WILEY, Appellant
V.
AMERICAN ZURICH INSURANCE COMPANY, Appellee
On Appeal from the 113th District Court
Harris County, Texas
Trial Court Case No. 2012-68770
MEMORANDUM OPINION
Appellant Willis Floyd Wiley appeals from the trial court’s dismissal of his
claims against Appellee American Zurich Insurance Company. We affirm.
BACKGROUND
Following the compensable work-related death of Lee Otis Ryans, Wiley
sought death benefits from Ryans’s employer’s worker’s compensation insurer,
American Zurich. At the conclusion of a Contested Case hearing, the Texas
Department of Insurance Division of Workers’ Compensation Hearing Officer
entered a November 30, 2010 order concluding that “Willis Floyd Wiley is not a
proper legal beneficiary of Lee Ryans, Decedent, and is not entitled to death
benefits.” The Appeals’ Panel rejected Wiley’s challenge to that order, and notice
was issued that the Hearing Officer’s Decision and Order became final on
February 28, 2011. The notice also stated, “If you are not satisfied with this
decision and desire to have the dispute resolved in court, then you must file a
lawsuit in the appropriate court.”
On March 28, 2011, Wiley sued American Zurich in federal district court
alleging civil rights violations. On October 12, 2011, the federal court dismissed
Wiley’s federal claims with prejudice and his state claims without prejudice.
More than a year later, on November 20, 2012, Wiley sued American Zurich
in state court under numerous statutory and constitutional theories, all related to
American’s Zurich’s denying him death beneficiary status. American Zurich
answered and filed a Plea to the Jurisdiction, arguing that the lawsuit challenging
the administrative beneficiary determination was untimely and, thus, the trial court
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lacked jurisdiction. Following a hearing, the trial court dismissed Wiley’s suit, and
Wiley timely filed this appeal.
JURISDICTION
In his sole issue on appeal, Wiley argues that the trial court erred by
dismissing his claims for lack of jurisdiction.
A. Applicable Law
Whether a court has subject-matter jurisdiction is a question of law reviewed
de novo. Texas Dep’t of Parks & Wildlife v. Miranda, 133 S.W.3d 217, 226 (Tex.
2004).
Judicial review of “a final decision of the appeals panel regarding
compensability or eligibility for or the amount of income or death benefits” is
provided for, and governed, by the Chapter 410 of the Texas Labor Code. TEX.
LAB. CODE ANN. § 410.301(a) (Vernon 2006); see also id. § 410.251 (providing for
judicial review of appeals panel’s decisions if administrative remedies are
exhausted). Chapter 410 also provides the deadline for seeking such review,
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.
Id. § 410.252(a).
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Pre-2000 cases uniformly interpreted this deadline to be mandatory and
jurisdictional. E.g., Tex. Workers’ Comp. Comm’n v. Hartford Accident & Indem.
Co., 952 S.W.2d 949, 952 (Tex. App.—Corpus Christi 1997, pet. denied) (citing
Morales v. Emp’rs Cas. Co., 897 S.W.2d 866, 868 (Tex. App.—San Antonio 1995,
writ denied)); Boone v. St. Paul Fire & Marine Ins. Co., 968 S.W.2d 468, 470
(Tex. App.—Fort Worth 1998, pet. denied); Benavidez v. Travelers Indem. Co. of
Conn., 960 S.W.2d 422, 424 (Tex. App.—Austin 1998, no pet.).
In 2000, the supreme court, in Dubai Petroleum Co. v. Kazi, overruled its
prior cases holding that failure to comply with statutory requirements is always
jurisdictional. 12 S.W.3d 71, 76 (Tex. 2000). At issue in Kazi was the statutory
requirement that—in a wrongful death suit involving the death of citizen of a
foreign country—the foreign county at issue “has equal treaty rights with the
United States on behalf of its citizens.” Id. at 73–74. The trial court in that case,
concluding that the plaintiffs did not meet their burden of demonstrating the
country at issue (India) had equal treaty rights with the United States, dismissed for
lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. Id. The supreme court disagreed, explaining
that the sound policy considerations mitigated against treating all statutory
prerequisites to suit as implicating subject-matter jurisdiction rather than the
plaintiff’s right to recover. Id. at 76–77.
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We have since embraced the Austin Court of Appeals’ approach to applying
Kazi as providing “a workable distinction between statutory requirements that
trigger jurisdictional implications after Kazi and those that do not.” Helton v. R.R.
Comm’n of Tex., 126 S.W.3d 111, 118 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2003, pet.
denied) (citing Sierra Club v. Tex. Natural Res. Conservation Comm’n, 26 S.W.3d
684 (Tex. App.—Austin 2000), aff’d, 70 S.W.3d 809 (Tex 2002)). Under that
framework, “[i]f a statutory requirement ‘defines, enlarges, or restricts the class of
cause the [trial] court may decide or the relief the court may award,’ the
requirement is jurisdictional.” Id. “If it does none of these, the statutory
requirement is but a condition on which the plaintiff's right to relief depends.” See
id.
With respect to the specific statutory deadline at issue in this case, the
Beaumont Court of Appeals and the Fourteenth District Court of Appeals in
Houston have acknowledged that Kazi may impact whether section 410.252(a)’s
deadline should be considered jurisdictional, but have saved resolution of that issue
for another day. Beaumont Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Parkerson, 105 S.W.3d 761, 762
n.1 (Tex. App.—Beaumont 2003, no pet.) (“We do not determine [whether it is
jurisdictional] as it is not necessary to the disposition of this appeal but note that
since Dubai Petroleum Co. v. Kazi, 12 S.W.3d 71 (Tex. 2000), it is
questionable.”); Ins. Co. of State of Pa. v. Flores, No. 14-05-00346-CV, 2006 WL
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1140388, at *1 n.1 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] April 27, 2006, no pet.)
(mem. op.) (“[I]n this restricted appeal, we need not determine whether the . . .
deadline is jurisdictional because the record lacks sufficient evidence to establish
whether [appellee] filed his petition within that deadline”).
The Fort Worth and Waco Courts of Appeals have considered, and
ultimately disagreed, about whether Kazi alters the classification of section
410.252(a)’s timeliness as jurisdictional. Compare Tex. Mun. League
Intergovernmental Risk Pool v. Burns, 209 S.W.3d 806, 812 n.9 (Tex. App.—Fort
Worth 2006, no pet.) (rejecting argument that, under Kazi, the deadline is a
limitations period rather than a jurisdictional requirement), with Tex. Dep’t of
Transp. v. Beckner, 74 S.W.3d 98, 103 (Tex. App.—Waco 2002, no pet.) (applying
Kazi to conclude that the deadline is “a limitations period, not a jurisdictional
requirement”).
And, finally, several courts of appeals—including our Court—have
continued to interpret section 410.252(a)’s deadline as jurisdictional without any
mention of a challenge to a jurisdictional plea as an appropriate procedural vehicle
based on Kazi. E.g., Davis v. Am. Cas. Co. of Reading, Pa., 408 S.W.3d 1, 6 (Tex.
App.—Amarillo 2012, pet. denied); DeVore v. Am. Mfr.’s Mut. Ins. Co., No. 01-
07-00495-CV, 2008 WL 2611886, at *2 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] June 27,
2008, no pet.); Fire & Cas. Ins. Co. of Conn. v. Miranda, 293 S.W.3d 620, 624–25
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(Tex. App.—San Antonio 2009, no pet.); LeBlanc v. Everest Nat’l Ins. Co., 98
S.W.3d 786, 787 (Tex. App.—Corpus Christi 2003, no pet.); Argonaut Sw. Ins. Co.
v. Walker, 64 S.W.3d 654, 657 (Tex. App.—Texarkana 2001, pet. denied). On
appeal, Wiley does not challenge American Zurich’s filing of a plea to the
jurisdiction as the appropriate vehicle for American Zurich to challenge the
timeliness of his filing. Thus, we review the trial court’s order as a jurisdictional
plea.
B. Analysis
Wiley had forty-five days to seek judicial review of the decision denying
him death-beneficiary status. TEX. LAB. CODE ANN. § 410.252(a). Almost twenty-
one months passed between the Appeals Panel’s notice to Wiley that the decision
denying his death-beneficiary status was final and Wiley’s filing the underlying
state court lawsuit challenging American Zurich’s decision denying him death-
beneficiary status. Wiley argues that his filing claims against American Zurich in
federal court—claims that were dismissed more than a year before the underlying
state court proceeding was filed—somehow renders his state court suit timely.
Wiley cites no authority in support of that proposition, and we have located none.
Because Wiley did not comply with the forty-five day filing deadline in section
410.252(a), the trial court properly dismissed the suit. See DeVore, 2008 WL
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2611886, at *2 (holding that trial court was without jurisdiction over untimely filed
suit seeking judicial review of workers’ compensation decision).
CONCLUSION
We affirm the trial court’s judgment.
Sherry Radack
Chief Justice
Panel consists of Chief Justice Radack and Justices Bland and Huddle.
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