Texas Judge Declared Vexatious Asks Fifth Circuit to Strike Law

Texas’s law penalizing litigants who repeatedly file pro se lawsuits is unconstitutional because it blocks people from filing new cases and prevents pursuit of a remedy, a state judge punished under the law argues.

During arguments Monday before the the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, the lawyer representing Madeleine Connor, a Democratic civil district court judge in Travis County, and five other plaintiffs stressed that a lower court incorrectly ruled the plaintiffs lack jurisdiction to bring the suit. Their lawyer, Mary Louise Serafine of Austin—who herself has been branded a vexatious litigant—said jurisdiction should be granted because ...