The Texas Supreme Court recently issued a decision in a mashup between Rule 202 (allowing presuit investigative depositions) and the world of blogging.
Someone going by the name “the Trooper” has a blog hosted by Google. The blog is devoted to castigating a company and its CEO, who resides in Houston. The CEO files a Rule 202 petition seeking to depose Google, asking that it give up the Trooper’s true identity. Google has no objection, but federal law allows it to divulge the information only if ordered to do so by a court. The CEO serves the Trooper with the petition through his blog email. The Trooper appears through a lawyer as John Doe and says his only connection with Texas is that his blog is read there and thus the court lacks personal jurisdiction over him. Unimpressed, the trial court orders the deposition. On writ of mandamus the Texas Supreme Court says that personal jurisdiction must exist to be able to order a Rule 202 deposition, and grants the writ. (And we all thought that boring first-year civil procedure class would never come in handy.) Otherwise, as the court notes, Texas would revert to its reputation as the legal “world’s forum of last resort,” inviting one and all to “come on down ” to the Lone Star State with legal issues far and wide. No more.
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