§ 85.006.Cause of Action Cumulative

One sentence keeping every other remedy available: the cause of action created by this chapter is cumulative of any other remedy provided by common law or statute.

The provision matters because stalking is rarely only stalking. The same course of conduct commonly supports several claims at once, and this section confirms the claimant need not choose.

What sits alongside it is a long list. Assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, invasion of privacy, and trespass at common law. By statute, the civil claims for unlawful disclosure of intimate visual material and for online impersonation both reach conduct that frequently accompanies stalking.

Bringing several claims is not merely tidy pleading. Each carries its own damages provision, its own limitations period, and its own standard of proof, so a claim that fails on one element may succeed on another set.

The chapter’s own damages provision is generous — actual damages including mental anguish, exemplary damages, and fees and costs — but the exemplary damages there remain subject to the general damages chapter.

Protective orders are the other remedy worth naming, and they are not damages at all. A civil damages claim does nothing to stop the conduct, and a stalking victim usually wants it stopped more than they want money.

The cumulative-remedy formula appears throughout this part of the code — in the trafficking, compelled prostitution, intimate visual material, and online impersonation chapters — and means the same thing in each.