10-3 Texas Citizens' Participation ACT (TCPA)
An emerging and troubling trend in non-compete litigation is the TCPA. The law is codified in Chapter 27 of the Civil Practice and Remedies Code and seems innocent on its face: citizens are protected from retaliatory lawsuits that seek to silence or intimidate them on matters of public concern. But the statute is broadly worded and is being broadly applied.
Texas courts' brief history of applying the broadly worded TCPA has not limited application of the Act's protection to weighty issues of great public concern. The dismissal mechanism of the statute has been applied in cases for fraud and barratry, a suit for...
