Observation in Court

COURT OBSERVATION

On March 23 2011, at 9:00am, there was a court a civil case jury trial held at the 268th District Court located in Richmond Texas, Fort Bend County. The Presiding Judge was Judge Brady Elliott. The case he was presiding over was a jury hearing of a civil suit between the City of Missouri city and the engineers they hired to design a plant. The company was supposed to perform a geo technical testing under contract on the property they were supposed to build the plant on and it failed to perform the test. The defendants in the case claim that the test were not done because of a discharge permit they needed to obtain but were not able to get because of protests from residents in the area. Their other defense was because the City director of Public Works advised them to hold off on getting the permit. The lawsuit involved the malpractice of the engineering company who failed to perform a geo technical test, which resulted in the city losing money and having to condemn a land. The city was suing for expenses incurred during the process, which included $95, 000 dollars paid to land owner. The total sum of the suit was for $250,000. The Attorneys present were Attorney Kramer and Attorney James Phillip. The City of Missouri City was also present; who were the plaintiffs and the defendants, Whendell Barnes and Susan Siegel were also present for the engineering firm, Carter and Bridges.

The case was being heard by the judge and also, there were 12 jury members present during the case. There were also witnesses available in the case also.

This case was already going on its eight date of hearing. At the beginning of the case, everyone stands for the Judge to enter the court room, then both parties started with their objections to the case to the prior days hearing, the plaintiff's attorney wanted to enter some more evidence into the case, which included past invoices and also objected to some witness being brought into the trial. The attorney also wanted to include some facts that supported the case defendant attorney objected to the invoices brought in because he stated that they were just brought in the same day of the trial, citing that there was sufficient time to look over the documents. He claimed that the invoices were never offered, even after they were requested and he did not think they should be allowed since the case was going into the eighth day of trial. The Judge sustained the objection. The defendant attorney also wanted the some of the suit for money to be dropped citing the amount had nothing to do with the case. The plaintiff was bringing in the amount from another case and the defending attorney did not believe it belonged to the case. The Judge listened and asked questions to both the attorney, then made his judgment as to allow some of the evidence to be entered into the deposition, while he threw ruled in the favor of the defendant to throw out the claim for