# Webb Consol. Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Marshall

Supreme Court of Texas, No. 24-0339

**Webb Consol. Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Marshall, No. 24-0339 (Tex. Apr. 24, 2026). Holding: When a school-board member obtains an injunction under Education Code Section 11.1512 ordering a district to turn over requested information immediately, the district complies, and the case becomes moot before final judgment, the member's claim for attorney's fees as a prevailing party remains live, and a board member need not exhaust administrative remedies by appealing to the Commissioner before suing for injunctive relief under that section.**

Practice areas: attorney fees, administrative law

## Key issues

- School-board members who won a temporary injunction ordering the district to produce records they were entitled to under Education Code § 11.1512 "prevailed" for attorney's-fee purposes even though their terms later expired, because the order effectively gave them the final relief the statute authorizes.
- The statute also excepts board members from the general requirement to exhaust administrative remedies before suing.

## Factual History
The Education Code gives school-board members acting in their official capacities "an inherent right of access to information, documents, and records maintained by the [school] district," lets a member sue for injunctive relief if the district does not timely deliver requested information, and entitles a member who "prevails" in such a suit to court costs and reasonable attorney's fees (Opinion, PDF pp. 1-2). Robert and Amy Marshall, board members of Webb Consolidated Independent School District, sent the District requests for information and documents on six items for a May 2020 board meeting and then sued under Section 11.1512(c-2) for injunctive relief and fees (Opinion, PDF pp. 2-4). On September 15, 2020, the trial court issued a "Temporary Injunction Order" finding the Marshalls made a proper request, that harm was imminent because they would be unable to address the issues before the Board, and that injunctive relief was authorized, and ordered the District to produce specific documents within twenty days, which the District did not appeal (Opinion, PDF pp. 4-5).

## Procedural History
Amy Marshall's term expired in November 2020, and the Marshalls amended their petition to seek injunctive relief on additional requests from 2019 and 2020 and pursued a separate administrative proceeding about the board's vote to censure them (Opinion, PDF p. 5). The District filed a plea to the jurisdiction and motion for summary judgment arguing the Marshalls failed to exhaust administrative remedies, Amy's claims were moot, and the District had provided all responsive documents; the trial court denied the motions, and the District took an interlocutory appeal, which stayed the case (Opinion, PDF p. 6). The Fourth Court of Appeals (San Antonio) held that the requests for information were moot because Robert Marshall's term had expired but that the Marshalls' claim for fees remained live because they had "prevailed," at least in part, by obtaining the temporary injunction, and it held Section 11.1512 an exception to exhaustion (Opinion, PDF pp. 6-7). The vehicle in this Court is a petition for review filed by the District, argued October 8, 2025, and decided April 24, 2026 (Opinion, PDF pp. 1, 19).

## Issues Presented
The District presents whether the court of appeals erred in concluding that the Marshalls attained prevailing-party status before their claims became moot based solely on a temporary injunction that did not resolve their claims on the merits, and whether they had to exhaust administrative remedies by appealing to the Commissioner (Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF p. 14). The Marshalls present whether their fee claims survive mootness because the temporary injunction gave them the ultimate relief they sought (Brief on the Merits (Respondent), PDF p. 7).

## Standard(s) of Review
The Court decided as questions of law whether the Marshalls "prevailed" under the statute and whether an exception to exhaustion applies, construing the statute from its plain meaning and treating "prevailing party" as a legal term of art (Opinion, PDF pp. 7-10, 16).

## Legal Arguments
**Whether the Marshalls prevailed before their claims became moot.**

**District (Petitioner):** A moot claim can be revived by a prevailing-party fee statute only if the party actually prevailed on the merits, and as a matter of law a temporary injunction does not resolve the merits but only maintains the status quo; the Marshalls obtained only a temporary injunction that neither resolved their claims nor materially changed the parties' legal relationship (Petition for Review (Petitioner), PDF p. 17; Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF pp. 14, 16; Reply Brief (Petitioner), PDF p. 6).

**Marshalls (Respondents):** The mandatory temporary injunction altered the status quo, did not require a bond, and set no trial date, and it furnished the ultimate goal of their litigation, the production of the specifically requested documents, which the District did not appeal (Brief on the Merits (Respondent), PDF p. 18; Response to Petition (Respondent), PDF p. 12).

**Whether the Marshalls had to exhaust administrative remedies.**

**District (Petitioner):** Disputes within the education system generally must be taken first to the Commissioner of Education (Opinion, PDF p. 15). **Marshalls (Respondents):** Section 11.1512 creates an exception, because it authorizes a "suit" for "appropriate injunctive relief" within a short statutory time frame (Opinion, PDF pp. 16-17).

## Stated Reasons the Court Should Take the Case
The District argued that the case lets the Court clarify that when a case becomes moot, attorney's fees may not be awarded under a prevailing-party statute unless the party actually prevailed on a claim, and that prevailing-party status requires actual and meaningful relief that alters the parties' legal relationship (Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF p. 16).

## Oral Argument

- **Temporary versus permanent.** Asked about a temporary injunction ordering documents versus a permanent one, the District's counsel said the permanent injunction follows a trial on the merits finding the documents were not provided. (Oral Argument, 0:07:47)
- **Everything but fees.** Asked whether the Marshalls received everything they requested, the District's counsel said yes, except attorney's fees, but they did not prevail on a decision of the merits. (Oral Argument, 0:09:22)
- **Continued requests.** Asked whether October documents answered later requests, the Marshalls' counsel said requests continued throughout the suit, so summary judgment was denied when the District claimed full production. (Oral Argument, 0:19:18)

## Practice Area Tags
attorney-fees, administrative-law

## Procedural Posture/Vehicle
Petition for review from the Fourth Court of Appeals (San Antonio) in an interlocutory appeal from the denial of a plea to the jurisdiction; argued October 8, 2025, and decided April 24, 2026 (Opinion, PDF pp. 1, 6-7, 19).

## Amicus Involvement
- [Mike Morath, Commissioner of Education](https://search.txcourts.gov/SearchMedia.aspx?MediaVersionID=3c557d6c-ee95-48e3-afe0-f627db93b0a8&coa=cossup&DT=BRIEFS&MediaID=d41910b7-4fe0-4af6-93b5-06853d5c1f95) addresses the exhaustion requirement of Education Code Section 7.057 and the court of appeals' holding that Section 11.1512(c-2) is an exception to it.
- [Wolfgang P. Hirczy de Mino](https://search.txcourts.gov/SearchMedia.aspx?MediaVersionID=b376119c-05c4-4e12-895c-ce493c44ebad&coa=cossup&DT=BRIEFS&MediaID=51438232-b818-4b48-bedb-85db6f029a0d) filed an amicus letter.

## Holding
When a school-board member obtains an injunction under Education Code Section 11.1512 ordering a district to turn over requested information immediately, the district complies, and the case becomes moot before final judgment, the member's claim for attorney's fees as a prevailing party remains live, and a board member need not exhaust administrative remedies by appealing to the Commissioner before suing for injunctive relief under that section (Opinion, PDF pp. 2, 18-19).

## Court's Reasoning
**General rule.** A party generally does not "prevail" by obtaining a temporary injunction, because a temporary injunction preserves the status quo and does not conclusively adjudicate the dispute, and the Court follows the federal approach, including *Lackey v. Stinnie*, treating "prevailing party" as a legal term of art (Opinion, PDF pp. 8-11).

**This injunction was different.** The trial court's order met the definition of a temporary injunction, but it did not merely preserve the status quo or award provisional relief: it granted the Marshalls the complete relief Section 11.1512 authorizes by ordering production of the documents, the District complied, and "there is no putting the genie back in the bottle," so the Marshalls prevailed in the only way the statute permitted (Opinion, PDF pp. 12-13). The Marshalls may recover only the fees incurred in connection with the documents covered by the September 2020 order, not fees for the whole case, and the Court presumed the evidence supported the order because no reporter's record of the injunction hearing was provided (Opinion, PDF p. 14).

**No exhaustion requirement.** Parties in education disputes generally must exhaust administrative remedies before the Commissioner, but there are limited statutory exceptions, and Section 11.1512(c-2), which authorizes a member to "bring suit" for "appropriate injunctive relief" when a district misses its short deadline to turn over information, contrasts with the "appeal" procedure of Section 7.057 and so creates an exception (Opinion, PDF pp. 15-18).

**Concurrence.** Justice Hawkins, joined by Justices Young and Sullivan, wrote to underscore that a party does not prevail merely by obtaining a temporary injunction, and that the order here functioned as ultimate relief because disclosed information cannot be recalled, so nothing in the opinion suggests that anything short of final judgment entitles a plaintiff to prevailing-party status under other fee-shifting statutes (Hawkins, J., concurring, PDF pp. 1-2).

## Disposition
Court of appeals' judgment affirmed and the case remanded to the trial court for a determination of the Marshalls' reasonable and recoverable attorney's fees (Opinion, PDF p. 19).

## Vote Breakdown
Justice Lehrmann delivered the opinion of the Court (Opinion, PDF p. 1). Justice Hawkins filed a concurring opinion, joined by Justices Young and Sullivan (Opinion, PDF p. 1).


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Source: The SCOTX Report, https://scotxreport.com/cases/24-0339. AI-generated summary of the Court's opinion, orders and the parties' briefs, with pin cites to the page of each document; verify against the Court's own documents at search.txcourts.gov.