Court of Appeals of Texas, 2015

Robert Lee Lyles v. State

Court of Appeals of Texas · Decided April 14, 2015

Opinion

COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIRST DISTRICT OF TEXAS AT HOUSTON ORDER ON MOTION FOR REHEARING Appellate case name: Robert Lee Lyles v. The State of Texas Appellate case number: 01-14-00859-CV Trial court case number: 2009-63597 Trial court: 151st Judicial District Court of Harris County The panel has voted to deny appellant’s motion for rehearing.1 It is ordered that the motion for rehearing is denied.

Judge’s signature: /s/ Laura C. Higley  Acting for the Court Panel consists of: Justices Keyes, Higley, and Brown Date: April 14, 2015

1 Because appellant is pro se, we note that none of the cases in appellant’s motion address his situation here where his untimely notice of appeal deprived this Court of jurisdiction to consider the merits of his appeal, and we clarify that our memo opinion noted he must file a bill of review in the trial court, not here. After the trial court’s plenary power expired, appellant’s only legal recourse is to file “[a] bill of review [which] is a new suit filed in the same court rendering the original judgment.” Urso v. Lyon Fin. Servs., Inc., 93 S.W.3d 276, 280 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2002, no pet.) (citation omitted). Generally, a bill-of-review plaintiff must file his claim within four years of rendition of the judgment he attacks. See PNS Stores, Inc. v. Rivera, 379 S.W.3d 267, 275 (Tex. 2012). Thus, appellant still has an available remedy by filing a bill of review in the trial court until four years after the October 4, 2013 final judgment, where he can try to prove lack of timely service of that judgment and, if unsatisfied, can then appeal any adverse bill-of-review decision to this Court.

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