33rd / 424th District Courts

Recent weeks have been somewhat arduous on me, but rather devastating to the necessary times for various cases to be heard. Some examples follow but to summarize, we've had to push jury trials, continued one due to crowding, have cut witnesses from cases and have severely limited presentation times.

In a recent jury trial a trial management order had to be imposed with time restrictions which were severe, being 10 hours each side for presentation of a complex divorce with substantial property (Gosnay, Blanco County).

In several bench trials over the last three weeks severe time limits have been imposed. One was a divorce (Wall, Burnet) where the attorneys announced for three hours. Because the morning docket had been overextended and there was a crowded afternoon docket each side was given 40 minutes. The case involved several parcels of real estate, two of which had varying amounts of reimbursements possible for separate property down payments.

Many examples could be given. It distresses me that this lack of visiting judges has this kind of impact on the parties and counsel. The scheduling has also had a huge impact on my ability to spend time in the office on either the "back-office" or administrative matters.