3-26-2008-
FOX TELLS CHICKENS ABOUT PLANS TO
SCRAMBLE EGGS
TPSA Leaders Go Back On Promises...AGAIN!
THIS STORY IS IN PROGRESS. PLEASE CHECK BACK FOR UPDATES
On Tuesday, TPSA President, Carl Weeks, unveiled his 2009 legislative agenda. TPSA
members were promised that the associations' leaders would NEVER pursue legislation
that would impose fees on the industry. Mr. Weeks is also Chairman of the Process Server
Review Board; a huge conflict of interest. This legislative agenda is a manifestation of that
conflict. TPSA members should be asking their leaders why they are trying to further
regulate the industry. All process servers ever wanted was the authority to serve process
on a statewide level. That has been accomplished.
LET'S NOT FORGET: THE PSRB, AT MR. WEEKS' SUGGESTION, HAS RECOMMENDED
THE SUPREME COURT CHANGE THE TRAINING REQUIREMENT FROM EVERY THREE
YEARS TO A YEARLY PROCESS! TPSA members were not polled on this issue.
Below is the TPSA leaders' legislative agenda with a comment to each:
1. Notary Public: This language would remove the requirement to have returns of service
notarized.
Statement under penalty of perjury waives 5th Am. rights under the Constitution. This
should be voluntary. Furthermore, this item does not require legislation. The Texas
Supreme Court could make this change with the stroke of a pen.
2. Corporate Registered Agent: This would fix the current problem of delivering to
corporate registered agents who use clerks to accept process.
This language should be comparable to Fed Rule 4, to serve corporate defendants through
any officer or manager in charge.
3. Trespass Defense: This language would provide a defense to prosecution if the actor
could establish he was in the act of delivering civil process and was certified by the
Supreme Court as a process server.
If there is a "No Trespassing" sign posted, there should be no defense to criminal
prosecution. That would nullify the citizen's protection of the Trespass laws. Even sheriffs
and constables cannot trespass for the purpose of serving civil court process.
4. PSRB Funding: This would enable the Supreme Court / OCA to collect a fee to fund the
operations of the Process Server Review Board
Everything else is just a smokescreen for this one purpose...to allow the PSRB to get
funding to perpetuate its unlawful practices. For Mr. Weeks to include this in a TPSA
legislative package is most disengenuious; as he is also the PSRB Chairman. The process
serving community would never willfully be in favor of being saddled with fees; and the
TPSA Board has officially informed their membership they would never support legislation
that did so.
5. Access to Gated Communities: This language would remove the liability on property
owners for granting access to gated communities to process servers when delivering civil
process..
This is absolutely a smoke and mirrors dance. Process servers will NEVER get this past
the Legislature, and TPSA leaders know it.
6. Assault on a Process Server: This would elevate the designation of process servers to
Public Servants for prosecution purposes if assaulted while delivering process.
This is a back-door approach to obtaining legislated regulation of private process servers.
Once you change the legal status of a process server, you create the impression of a need
to protect the public from abuse. Once the public appears to need protection from an
occupation or profession, the legislature WILL regulate that occupation or profession.
Furthermore, assault is already against the law.
7. Criminal History Access: This would authorize the PSRB to access computerized
criminal history data from DPS for official purposes related to the PSRB
There is no need for criminal history access by an unlawfully created Board. This will only
further empower a kangaroo court to continue its extermination of the innocent, as it has
been doing since its inception in July 2005. This is an invasion of privacy; and unless the
occupation or profession of the private process server is legislatively regulated, it will never
happen. It would be unconstitutional from the day it ever passed into law.
TPW will continue to analyze and monitor this developing
story. Please check back often and join the CCPSAT for
FREE at www.ccpsat.org to receive alerts by email.
Story by:
Tod E. Pendergrass
Director, Texas Process Watch
Director, The Certified Civil Process Servers Association of Texas