Last week, Norred Law was honored to represent a client before the Texas Supreme Court, as our client has sued the Department of State Health Services (DSHS, often pronounced as “dishes”), the Texas agency responsible for proper handling of radioactive materials. 

Our client owns property in Denton County, which it received in a foreclosure proceeding. The previous tenants included US Radiopharmaceuticals (“USR”) which promised to do big things, but closed in 2009, and then abandoned the property in 2019, leaving low level radioactive materials on the property, locked in a big bunker. 

Though DSHS has a judgment against USR to clean up the property, DSHS has tried to force our client to clean it up, and effectively allowed USR to waltz away. No one knows why. At the same time, Denton County and Denton ISD wanted our client to pay taxes on the radioactive materials, though our clients did not foreclose on the materials. (Foreclosing on real estate does not come with the personal property on the property, like an eviction does not mean the landlord now owns the boat in the garage.) 

Faced with the tax hunger of the local taxing agencies (which exceeds $700k+ for past taxes from 2016 ) and the state’s desire to force our client to pay for the cleanup of the radioactive materials, we sued the state on our client’s behalf, seeking to force the state to stop treating it as the owner of the materials. The district court found in our favor, and the Third Court of Appeals in Austin reversed, and here we are. 

Chad Lampe began our opening and I wrapped it up. Counsel for DSHS gave her response, and then I provided our rebuttal. All in all, it went well. The justices were engaged, and asked good questions. 

I like this case because it shows the dereliction of duty for doing the right thing by state agents who pay no price for their incompetence and overreach, and limitless energy to punish those who ask simply that they do their job. Oh, that we could bring back tar and feathers!