City of Dallas v. Carbajal

Because the police report here was at most an initial response to the accident, the governmental unit, the City of Dallas, lacked actual notice. The provision of notice is a jurisdictional requirement in all suits against a governmental unit. Accordingly, the judgment of the court of appeals is reversed and the case is dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Texas Supreme Court, No. 09-0427, 05-10-2010

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In this case, we determine whether a police report noting the perceived cause of an accident provides a governmental unit with actual notice of its fault in causing the accident. When a claimant fails to timely provide a governmental unit with formal notice of a claim, see TEX. CIV. PRAC. & REM. CODE § 101.101(a), the Texas Tort Claims Act requires the governmental unit to have “actual notice that . . . the claimant has received some injury,” id. § 101.101(c). In Texas Department of Criminal Justice v. Simons, we clarified that merely investigating an accident does not provide a governmental unit with actual notice-that is, with subjective awareness of its fault. See 140 S.W.3d 338, 343–48 (Tex. 2004). Because the police report here was at most an initial response to the accident, we hold that the governmental unit, the City of Dallas, lacked actual notice. The provision of notice is a jurisdictional requirement in all suits against a governmental unit. TEX. GOV’T CODE § 311.034. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the court of appeals and render judgment dismissing the case for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.

Olivia Carbajal sued the City for injuries she sustained after driving onto an excavated road. A Dallas police officer who responded to the accident filed a written report describing the accident, in relevant part, as follows:

Comp[lainant] said that she saw the barricades but none were blocking what she thought was a clear way to get on the freeway. Comp[lainant] said that before she knew it she had driven her veh[icle] into a gap on the street. [I] observed at the listed offense loc[ation] that there were no barricades blocking the gap in the road. Summarizing the incident, the report states that Carbajal drove her “veh[icle] into [a] gap in [the] street [that] was not properly blocked.” Approximately a year after the accident, Carbajal filed this suit against the City. It is undisputed that Carbajal did not provide formal notice as required by § 101.101(a). Carbajal contends, however, that the police report provided the City with subjective awareness of the claim, thereby establishing actual notice under § 101.101(c). Arguing that the report did not provide actual notice, the City filed a plea to the jurisdiction. The trial court denied the plea, and the court of appeals affirmed. 278 S.W.3d 802.

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