Texas Business Court Grows Up, Prepares for Its First Jury Trial

Texas Business Court is growing up.

The upstart venue, established two years ago as a challenge to longstanding business courts like Delaware Chancery, is slated to have its first jury trial next week. For Judge Grant Dorfman, who presides over the Eleventh Business Court Division in Houston, that means tackling issues others don’t have to. Specifically, without a dedicated courtroom, where is he even going to seat jurors?

In its first year (ending Aug. 31), 185 cases were filed at the court, and about 120 more have come in since then. The court is looking to attract more — Dorfman and others have brought their pitch around Texas and beyond (even hitting Argentina) to encourage lawyers to file there.

Their promise: the court offers quicker and more predictable scheduling. A smaller caseload means judges can delve deeper into the arguments.

What they don’t offer, at the moment, is a definite courtroom assignment.

Texas Business Court Eleventh Division Judge Grant Dorfman

Photo courtesy of Grant Dorfman

“The challenge we have now is strictly space-related, which is: where are we gong to have our jury trials?” Dorfman said in a video interview last week. The court has gotten access to other courtrooms for bench trials, but some of them don’t have a witness box or jury box.

The first jury trial could be a dispute between two businesses over the management rights and profits of a crude oil delivery system.

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Basic Things

Dorfman says he took for granted things as a district court judge, where “I had everything provided for me — I had my cases, I had a courtroom, I had parking, staff, court reporter. Didn’t need to worry about those basic things,” he said. “We’ve had to worry about it.”

Beyond just the practicalities of starting up a new court, Dorfman — who previously worked as senior in-house counsel for Nabors Industries Inc., was of counsel at what was then Sheehy, Ware & Pappas, and worked in the Texas attorney general’s office — says he’s enjoyed the challenge of working with his fellow justices to figure out the nuts and bolts of procedure, as well as the opportunity to shape case law.

“As our cases age, so do the decisions,” he said.

The biggest challenge he sees? “Success is our biggest danger, which is a good problem to have.”

“We’re sending that message, that, look, we want your cases. The typical state court judge has more than enough cases. They don’t have to go shopping for them or try to solicit them. But we want more, and we think we’ve got a good product, and we want you to know it’s out there, and that you’ll give us a chance and come file your cases.”

Reaching a place where the court can no longer offer the certainty of timing is one thing he’s wary of, given the emphasis that the court is presently placing on efficiency. “We can give you a date certain by which your case will be resolved,” he said. “We’ll work with you to have a scheduling order that reflects the simplicity or the narrowness or you just need a legal decision.”

A Business Opening

Asked what business cases he’s been paying attention to, he mentions two notable disputes in Delaware: the Tesla Inc. compensation battle and the Moelis & Co. case.

“It’s interesting because part of what that body of case law that Delaware has a head start on is valuable because it’s stable and predictable,” Dorfman said. “But lately, the last few years, they haven’t been all that stable or predictable. So maybe that gives us an opening as we develop our case law more fully to offer those qualities to people.”

When he was hearing cases as a trial judge, “I was very mindful when I’m doing a Delaware case, I’ve got a forest of precedents,” he said. “When you’re in Texas law, by conversely, you’ve got a handful of ferns over in the corner.”

Building the Texas court’s body of case law will mean “that Delaware advantage is diminished,” he said.