Thanks for visiting! Welcome to a new way to research case law. You are viewing a free summary from Descrybe.ai. For citation and good law / bad law checking, legal issue analysis, and other advanced tools, explore our Legal Research Toolkit — not free, but close.
Angela Mae Brannan, Individually and as Independent of the Estate of Bob Albert Brannan v. State
Citation: Not availableDocket: 01-08-00179-CV
Court: Court of Appeals of Texas; May 1, 2014; Texas; State Appellate Court
Original Court Document: View Document
A beach-access dispute arose involving the Texas Open Beaches Act concerning appellants' beach houses on Pedestrian Beach in Surfside after storms shifted the vegetation line landward. Following the Texas Supreme Court's ruling in *Severance v. Patterson*, the Court of Appeals vacated its earlier judgment and reassessed the case. The appellants claimed the State unlawfully took their property without just compensation and sought damages and an injunction against a public easement. The State acknowledged the need to reverse the previous summary judgment but proposed that further arguments remained due to the inapplicability of its prior rolling-easement theory. The Village of Surfside Beach and Mayor Larry Davison requested a judgment in their favor or a remand for further record development. The Surfrider Foundation, a new intervenor, contended that the *Severance* decision should be interpreted narrowly, indicating that factual determinations were necessary before resolving the takings claim. The Court noted that remand is appropriate when there are errors in the trial court's judgment, particularly if previous legal standards were overruled or if the record suggests the possibility of recovery under alternative legal theories not previously explored. Given that the trial court's summary judgment was based on outdated legal interpretations prior to *Severance*, and acknowledging that both the factual record and legal arguments were insufficiently developed, the Court reversed the summary judgment favoring the State and remanded for further proceedings based on the principles established in *Severance*.