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A directive (effective January 1, 2026) applying the Second Administrative Judicial Region’s Rule 11 on attorney vacations consistently in the 12th and 278th District Courts across Walker, Madison, Grimes and Leon Counties (Walker County edition). An attorney (lead counsel) may designate up to four vacation weeks per year: summer designations (June–August) must be filed with the district clerk by May 15 and protect even against earlier-signed settings; non-summer designations must be filed by February 1, may not run more than two consecutive weeks, and do not protect against earlier-signed settings. The court confirms by letter whether the dates are protected.
Texas > Walker County > 12th & 278th District Courts. Shared 12th & 278th Judicial District instrument; Walker County edition.
[Letterhead: DAVID MOORMAN, Judge, 12th Judicial District Court — Walker County Courthouse, 1100 University Avenue, Suite 303, Huntsville, Texas 77340, (936) 436-4915, (936) 435-8025 facsimile; TRACY SORENSEN, Judge, 278th Judicial District Court — Walker County Courthouse, 1100 University Avenue, Suite 202, Huntsville, Texas 77340, (936) 436-4916, (936) 436-4917 facsimile; seal of the State of Texas] September 18, 2025 Re: Attorney Vacations in Walker County, Madison County, Grimes County and Leon County in the 12th Judicial District Court and 278th Judicial District Court Dear Counsel: Effective January 1, 2026, the 12th District Court and the 278th District Court are going to start consistently implementing and applying the Second Administrative Judicial Region of Texas’ Rule 11 regarding attorney vacations. Rule 11 states as follows: 11.1 Designation of Vacation. Subject to the provision of 11.2 and 11.3 of this rule, an attorney may designate not more than four weeks of vacation during a calendar year as vacation, during which that attorney will not be assigned to trial or required to engage in any pretrial proceedings. This rule operates only where lead counsel, as defined by TRCP 8, is affected, unless the trial court expands coverage to other counsel. 11.2 Summer Vacations. Written designation for vacation weeks during June, July or August must be filed with the district clerk by May 15. Summer vacation weeks so designated will protect the attorney from trials during those summer weeks, even if an order setting the case for trial was signed before the vacation designation was filed. 11.3 Non-Summer Vacations. Written designation for vacation in months other than June, July or August must be filed with the district clerk by February 1. Non-summer vacation weeks may not run consecutively for more than two weeks at a time. Non-summer vacation weeks so designated will not protect an attorney from a trial by an order signed before the date the designation is filed. When your vacation letters are filed with the district clerk, the courts will confirm by letter that your vacation dates are (1) protected from all settings, (2) protected from future settings or (3) not protected. If your dates are not protected the court will indicate the reason in the confirmation.
Reviewer note: AJR-2 cluster (12th/278th/506th). Source instrument read via text lane; classified RULE under the records-vs-rules doctrine. Composed benchpath-ajr2-cluster. [RECOMPOSED 2026-09-21 (corpus-0920 P7, digital-layer lane): the full text of the registered file (sha256 53a4d7964e66..., 1 pages) replaces the earlier 508-character abstract. Method: pypdfium2 text layer reflowed page-aware, cross-checked word-by-word against PyMuPDF (0 substantive difference(s), 0 page-furniture), owner-corpus candidate sentences 100% (4/4) matched, 0 running header/footer line(s) removed, no U+FFFD/U+FFFE/form-feed debris. NOT yet checked page by page against the render, so confidence is medium with an open re-verification task; flip to high when a reviewer has read every page against the PDF. benchpath-tx-corpus0920-p7-2026-09-21] [BY-EYE CHECK 2026-09-21 (corpus-0920 P11): every page of the registered file (sha256 53a4d7964e66..., 1 page(s)) read against the rendered PDF; file-stamp, caption and signature-block defects of the text layer corrected from the render; confidence lifted to high. benchpath-tx-corpus0920-p11-2026-09-21]
Standing order of the 109th Judicial District Court for every pending or later-filed case in Andrews, Winkler and Crane Counties: any attorney or self-represented litigant who uses any form of artificial intelligence for legal research or drafting in a case must, before using AI-generated information in a court submission or proceeding, sign and submit the court's certification form stating that all language, quotations, sources, citations, arguments and legal analysis created or contributed to by generative AI were verified as accurate by a human through traditional (non-AI) legal sources, and acknowledging responsibility and potential sanctions for their or their co-counsel's failure to comply. Effective immediately; in effect until rescinded or replaced.
Standing order of the 109th Judicial District Court for every pending or later-filed case in Andrews, Winkler and Crane Counties: any attorney or self-represented litigant who uses any form of artificial intelligence for legal research or drafting in a case must, before using AI-generated information in a court submission or proceeding, sign and submit the court's certification form stating that all language, quotations, sources, citations, arguments and legal analysis created or contributed to by generative AI were verified as accurate by a human through traditional (non-AI) legal sources, and acknowledging responsibility and potential sanctions for their or their co-counsel's failure to comply. Effective immediately; in effect until rescinded or replaced.