What H-E-B v. Peterson Means for Injured Texans
If you slip and fall in a Texas grocery store, gas station, or restaurant, can you sue? The answer just got more complicated. On April 10, 2026, the Texas Supreme Court handed down H-E-B, LP v. Peterson — a unanimous opinion that makes it harder than ever to win a slip-and-fall case in Texas. Here’s what happened, what it means, and what you need to do if you’ve been hurt on someone else’s property.
What Happened to Marissa Peterson?
Marissa Peterson was shopping in the toy aisle at an HEB grocery store when she slipped on a clear puddle of water, fell, and hurt her knee. She looked up and saw water dripping from a ceiling rafter directly above the puddle. Her companion noticed buckets, signs, and trash cans scattered around other parts of the store catching leaks from a known roof problem tied to a remodeling project.
The store had been leaking for over a year. It had rained earlier that day. No HEB employee had walked down the toy aisle in the two hours before Peterson fell. Seems like a winning case, right?
The Texas Supreme Court said no. Peterson lost.
Download the full opinion (PDF)
The Rule: You Have to Prove How Long the Hazard Was There
To win a slip-and-fall case in Texas, an injured customer (called an “invitee”) must prove four things:
- The property owner knew or should have known about the dangerous condition
- The condition was unreasonably dangerous
- The owner failed to use reasonable care to fix it or warn about it
- That failure caused the injury
The fight in almost every slip-and-fall case is over element one: knowledge. There are two flavors:
- Actual knowledge — an employee saw the spill, caused it, or was told about it
- Constructive knowledge — the spill was there long enough that the owner should have discovered it
Most slip-and-fall cases turn on constructive knowledge, because store employees rarely admit they saw the spill before you fell. And constructive knowledge requires temporal evidence – proof of how long the hazard sat there before the injury.
Why Peterson Lost
Peterson offered a stack of evidence that would seem powerful to most jurors:
- The roof had been leaking for a year
- It rained two hours before her fall
- Water was dripping from the rafter above the puddle
- The puddle was about two feet across
- No HEB employee had walked down the aisle in two hours
- HEB had a heightened inspection protocol during rainstorms – and didn’t follow it
The Texas Supreme Court walked through every piece of evidence and rejected each one. The Court’s reasoning came down to a single principle: evidence about what caused a hazard is not evidence of how long the hazard existed.
- The rain stopping two hours earlier? That’s about cause, not duration inside the store.
- Water dripping from above? Also cause – it doesn’t tell you when the puddle started forming.
- The size of the puddle? Size alone doesn’t let a jury guess at duration.
- HEB’s inspection protocol? Internal policies don’t raise the legal standard of care.
- Roof leaks elsewhere in the store? Not relevant, because they weren’t in the toy aisle where Peterson fell.
The Court relied on a 1996 case called City of San Antonio v. Rodriguez, which held that “the leaky roof was not itself a dangerous condition; it could only cause a dangerous condition.” Knowledge has to match the time and place of the injury — not some earlier situation that produced it.
What This Means If You’ve Been Hurt
The Texas Supreme Court has now reinforced this rule three times in two years (Brookshire Grocery v. Taylor, Albertsons v. Mohammadi, and now Peterson). The message is clear: scant circumstantial evidence is not enough. Texas slip-and-fall plaintiffs need real, concrete proof of duration to survive summary judgment.
Here’s what makes a case strong under the current law:
- Surveillance video showing the spill present minutes or hours before the fall
- Employees walking past the hazard in the moments before the injury (the winning fact pattern from Brookshire Brothers v. Aldridge)
- Sweep logs or inspection sheets showing gaps in cleaning
- Witnesses who saw the spill earlier in the day
- Physical evidence like dried edges, dirt, multiple cart tracks – but only when combined with other duration evidence
- An employee admission that they saw the spill, caused it, or were told about it
Why Acting Fast Matters More Than Ever
The single biggest reason slip-and-fall cases fail in Texas is loss of evidence. Most stores overwrite their surveillance video within 30 days – sometimes within a week. Sweep logs go missing. Witnesses scatter. Memories fade.
If you’ve been injured on someone else’s property, the clock is already running. You need an attorney sending preservation letters, demanding video, identifying witnesses, and locking down sweep logs immediately. By the time you’ve recovered enough to think about a lawsuit, the evidence that wins the case may already be gone.
Lo esencial
Texas slip-and-fall law is harder on plaintiffs than the law in many other states. The Texas Supreme Court has made clear it will not relax the burden of proof, even in cases with sympathetic facts. But “harder” does not mean “impossible.” Cases with video, employee proximity, sweep log gaps, or witness testimony about duration still win – and win regularly.
The difference between a winning case and a dismissed one often comes down to what gets preserved in the first 30 days.
Hurt in a Slip-and-Fall? Talk to a Lawyer Now.
If you or a loved one has been injured in a fall at a grocery store, retail location, restaurant, or any other property in Texas, contact our personal injury team for a free consultation. We’ll evaluate your case, send preservation letters to protect critical evidence, and tell you honestly whether your claim has a path forward under current Texas law.
