HOUSTON – The Texas 1st Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Harris County and other municipalities in an appeal by a Houston man who alleged the county took and sold his property without providing compensation.
Glenn Herbert Johnson was denied an appeal on six issues in a 17-page opinion issued by the court on Feb. 27. The court overruled all of Johnson’s issues and affirmed the ruling of the Harris County Civil Court of Law Nov. 2.
"Johnson's argument also includes several pages of citation to legal authority yet he provides no analysis of the authorities or explanation of how they are relevant to the issues presented," Justice Russell Lloyd wrote. "Johnson has presented nothing for our review."
Texas First District Court of Appeals Justice Russell Lloyd
| txcourts.gov/
These appeals stemmed from a case in 2009 when Harris County sued Johnson for unpaid property tax, a default judgment was entered against Johnson, and the property was sold at auction to cover tax liens.
In response, on May 29, 2015, Johnson sued Harris County for allegedly causing him to file for inverse condemnation and alleged Harris County “took his property for public use” without producing reimbursement.
Johnson’s first three issues are “that the trial court erred in granting Harris County’s summary judgment motion because it was not timely filed,” and “the trial court erred in rendering judgment against him because Harris County failed to provide him with notice of its summary judgment motion or of its submission to the court for a ruling,” Lloyd wrote.
Harris County alleged Johnson was issued the summary judgment motions to the email address that was given when Johnson filed his pleadings. He allegedly told the law firm representing the county that he needed them to send further communications to a different email address or his home address, Johnson said.
“There is no evidence of this conversation in the record,” according to the ruling. “...(Harris County) argued that Johnson neither filed a change of address nor identified ... as his email address until he filed his post-judgment motion."
Johnson's argument that the county allegedly failed to serve him with citations was overruled because Harris County was not required to serve them to Johnson.
Lloyd also did not agree with Johnson that the trial court erred in granting summary judgment because the county did not present proper evidence.
"It is undisputed that Johnson did not file a response to Harris County’s no-evidence summary judgment. The trial court properly granted Harris County’s no-evidence motion,” the ruling stated. “... Harris County also moved for no-evidence summary judgment on the ground that adequate time for discovery had passed, and Johnson had no evidence supporting the intent element, the public use element, and the damages element of his claim.”
In the sixth issue, Johnson filed the trial court erred in the granting summary judgment because he was not given the opportunity to object it. Lloyd overruled this, stating that a hearing was held on the motion on July 31, 2018, and Johnson failed to appear.