Garnishments Are Alive and Well in Texas

While Texas doesn’t permit a judgment creditor to garnish your wages directly from your employer, Texas law does allow your bank accounts to be garnished.  So, when you deposit your pay into a bank account, that account can be frozen if your judgment creditor applies to the court for a writ of garnishment of your accounts.  In reality, your judgment creditor can reach your bank deposits regardless of the name on the account if the funds in the account are owed to you.  Frankfurt’s Texas Investment Corp. v. Trinity Savings & Loan Ass’n, 414 S.W.2d 190, 195 (Tex. Civ. App- Dallas 1967, writ ref’d n.r.e.).

Your judgment creditor may also get to your bank account even if community property assets are in the account.  Tatum State Bank v. Gibson, 24 S.W.2d 506, 507 (Tex. Civ. App.-Texarkana 1930, no writ); Brooks v. Sherry Lane National Bank, 788 S.W.2d 874, 876 (Tex. App.-Dallas 1990, no writ).  But, bank accounts are not the only assets you might own that are subject to garnishment.  Other frequently garnished assets are:

a. Safe-deposit boxes

Your judgment creditor can reach the contents of your safe-deposit box even if your bank doesn’t know what’s inside the box.  Blanks v. Radford, 188 S.W.2d 879, 886 (Tex. Civ. App.-Eastland 1945, writ ref’d w.o.m.).

b. Stock

Every stock you possess is specifically subject to garnishment in Tex. R. Civ. P. 669.

c. Promissory note

If someone is repaying you money on a promissory note to you, that note can be garnished. Thompson v. Gainesville National Bank, 18 S.W. 350 (Tex. 1886); Davis v. First National Bank, 135 S.W.2d 259, 261 (Tex. Civ. App.- Waco 1939, no writ). In other words, your debtor on the note will be required to make the repayments to your judgment creditor.

d. A Trust fund to which you are a beneficiary

Assets in a trust fund and the revenue from trust funds may be garnished.  The only exception is when the trust fund is a spend-thrift trust. Nunn v. Titche-Goettinger Co., 245 S.W. 421, 422-23 (Tex. Comm’n App. 1922, judgm’t adopted); Bank of Dallas v. Republic National Bank of Dallas, 540 S.W.2d 499, 501-02 (Tex. Civ. App.-Waco 1976, writ ref’d n.r.e.).

e. Judgments You Have

If you are a judgment creditor in another matter, that judgment can be garnished.  Industrial Indemnity Co. v. Texas American Bank-Riverside, 784 S.W.2d 114, 119-120 (Tex. App.-Fort Worth 1990, no writ).   In other words, your judgment debtor in that matter will pay your judgment creditor in the matter in which you are the judgment debtor.

So, simply because Texas doesn’t allow your wages to be garnished to collect a judgment, don’t assume you’re totally immune to additional forms of garnishment.  An aggressive judgment creditor has lots of alternatives on hand to enforce a judgment against you.

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Frankfurt Trust