Smith v. Davis

OPINION

JOSEPH B. MORRIS, Justice.

In this case, we decide whether a county employee, sued independently from his employer, may assert official and sovereign immunity as defenses against a tort claim. Robert Earl Davis sued two Ellis County deputy sheriffs in then’ individual and official capacities based on events surrounding his arrest for telephone harassment and the eventual dismissal of the charges against him. One of the deputy sheriffs, O.D. Smith, Jr., brings this interlocutory appeal challenging the trial court’s refusal to grant him summary judgment on Davis’s claim against him for…