§ 63.001.Grounds

Three routes to a writ, and the third is the one used constantly.

Garnishment reaches property of the defendant in a third party’s hands — most often a bank holding an account, but also an employer, a customer, or anyone else owing the defendant money.

The first ground is that an original attachment has been issued. Garnishment then runs alongside the attachment, reaching assets held elsewhere.

The second is pre-judgment garnishment on affidavit, requiring three sworn statements: that the debt is just, due, and unpaid; that within the plaintiff’s knowledge the defendant does not possess property in Texas subject to execution sufficient to satisfy the debt; and that the garnishment is not sought to injure the defendant or the garnishee.

The second of those is demanding. A plaintiff must swear that the defendant lacks sufficient reachable property — which is a statement about the defendant’s whole estate, made before any discovery.

Note that the garnishee is protected as well as the defendant. The affidavit must deny an intent to injure either, which acknowledges that garnishment imposes real burdens on an innocent third party.

The third ground is post-judgment: a plaintiff with a valid, subsisting judgment who swears that, within the plaintiff’s knowledge, the defendant does not possess sufficient property subject to execution.

This is the ordinary collection tool. A judgment creditor who cannot find leviable assets garnishes the debtor’s bank, and the writ freezes the account on service.

"Valid, subsisting" carries the dormancy rules with it — a judgment that has gone dormant is not subsisting, and will not support the writ until revived.