Background and Procedural Posture

This appeal arises from Kreines v. ES3 Minerals, LLC, a case that was transferred from district court to the Business Court. The appeal reached the Fifteenth Court of Appeals, which has jurisdiction over Business Court appeals, and concerns a temporary injunction and the bond amount securing it. The case involves Nicholas Kreines, David P. Ryan, Liberty Mineral Partners LLC, Nak Resources INC., and CGR Oil and Gas, LLC as appellants against appellee ES3 Minerals, LLC.

The procedural complexity stems from the case's transfer mid-litigation: certain orders were entered by the district court before transfer, while the Business Court handled subsequent proceedings. This created a question about how appellate courts should review pre-transfer orders and whether the Business Court must formally "adopt" or reconsider rulings made before the case arrived in its docket.

Chief Justice Brister's Dissent on Review Standards

Chief Justice Brister's dissent addresses two fundamental issues about transferred-case procedure. First, he emphasizes that the Business Court possesses full plenary power over all orders in a transferred case, writing that the Business Court "has plenary power to reconsider, modify, or revoke previous orders, but there is no need to 'adopt' them, nor to read all the evidentiary record to see if they were correct." This reflects his view that court orders belong to the institution, not individual judges.

Second, and more critically, Brister objects to the majority's apparent limitation on appellate review based on whether litigants re-raised objections after transfer. He states unequivocally:

Appeal of a transferred case cannot be split in parts, filing the parts of a case argued to the Business Court in our Court, and the parts argued to and signed by a previous judge to a different one. Court orders are orders of the court; they are not personal and there is no dishonor in being reversed for declining to re-visit every issue a previous judge decided.

This passage reveals Brister's concern that the majority opinion creates a bifurcated appellate standard that could leave pre-transfer rulings effectively unreviewable unless parties object anew before the transferee court. He argues that declining review simply because litigants did not raise an objection a second time upon transfer to a new court is improper.

The Mootness Question and Trial Imminence

Brister's dissent takes a pragmatic turn regarding disposition. He notes that the Business Court had set the case for trial on December 8, 2025. Given this imminent trial, he would not remand with instructions to "conduct an evidentiary hearing" on bond amount or to "adopt the reasoning of the District Court with respect to the remainder of the temporary injunction order."

Instead, Brister invokes recent Texas Supreme Court precedent, quoting Harley Channelview Props., LLC v. Harley Marine Gulf, LLC, 690 S.W.3d 32, 38 (Tex. 2024): "Generally the most expeditious way of obviating the hardship and discomfiture of an unfavorable preliminary order is to try the case on its merits." His position is straightforward: the bond amount and form of the temporary injunction will become moot once the case is tried, making further preliminary proceedings unnecessary.

Brister concludes he "would not urge the judge below to take any steps other than that"—meaning the Business Court should simply proceed to trial rather than conduct additional hearings on interlocutory matters that will soon be superseded by a final judgment.