New trial expected in siblings’ battle over historic ranch
PRESIDIO COUNTY — A March 11 district court ruling reinstated James “Jim” White III as trustee of the Brite Ranch, following an appeals court ruling in his favor. A September 2023 district court ruling had removed him from running the ranch as trustee of the Jane White Trust and barred him from living on the property after a jury found he breached his fiduciary duties by not effectively managing the monetary distributions of the trust to other beneficiaries — his siblings.
In December, the 8th Court of Appeals in El Paso ruled in favor of Jim, invalidating the jury findings and subsequent rulings and making way for a new trial with plaintiffs Mac and Beau White — seeking another removal of Jim as trustee. That trial is expected to be in January of next year in Presidio County District Court unless a settlement is reached. All principal parties in the case have declined to comment on the legal proceedings.
The district court decision, though a win for Jim, is still entangled in more than a dozen motions currently being considered in several lawsuits between the parties, which have been warring over the future of the 61,548-acre historic ranch in western Presidio County since 2018.
The actual ranch land is owned by the Jane White Trust (the siblings’ late mother) and four of her children’s individual trusts.
Court testimony has shown that the ranch needs ongoing maintenance, particularly to fix water infrastructure and manage hunting and grazing leases. “It’s clear that there needs to be a trustee running the ranch so that bills can be paid and the Brite Ranch can be conserved and protected,” Jim’s attorney, David Reber, told visiting 394th District Judge Tryon Lewis in the March 4 hearing.
Mac and Beau’s attorneys agreed that someone should be running the ranch. But they told Lewis that since Jim testified in the initial trial that he had breached his obligatory duties by failing to communicate with his brothers on investments in the ranch, the judge should not reinstate him and should instead appoint an “unbiased” individual. They added that the trust rules state that when there is a vacancy in the trustee position “for any reason,” the siblings should elect a trustee to run the ranch.
Jim’s attorneys argued successfully that there never was a vacancy because the appeals court nullified removing Jim. An attorney for Jim’s son, Cuatro, an heir to the ranch trusts, added that what Mac and Beau were trying to do is “reverse the El Paso court,” said Donovan Campbell Jr. “No trial court has the authority or ability to reverse an appellate court that has already issued an opinion on the case.” The attorney said the jury’s decision in the 2023 trial also showed that Jim’s actions had not damaged the trust, nor did he personally profit from them.
“Any prior orders of the Court … restricting or barring James E. White Ill’s access or control of
the real property of the Jane White Trust, as Trustee thereof, are of no longer in
force and effect,” Judge Lewis wrote in the March 11 ruling.
Jim’s attorney also asked that all funds held by the court be released to Jim. However, Lewis ruled instead that Jim make an accounting of all trust assets.
Also at play in the legal proceedings are the intervenors — Cuatro, and two of Jim’s other children, Clint White and Marti White Wright — who have filed numerous petitions related to the cases and their own lawsuits. Attorneys and the judge also are considering naming numerous relatives as “necessary parties” in the lawsuits — Jim’s daughter Raphael White Woodward and Geoffrey Connor, a 61-year-old attorney in Bastrop whom Mac and Beau both adopted in 2022. Jim and Cuatro’s attorneys are arguing that the adoption was a “fraudulent” attempt to create an heir for Mac and Beau, who have no biological children, and Cuatro has filed a lawsuit against his uncles making that claim.
The court will meet again on April 15 at the Presidio County Courthouse. The March 4 hearing was held online due to the courthouse closing early after high winds knocked out power.
For more background on the lawsuits, visit bigbendsentinel.com/brite-lawsuit.
