Waller County judge says new hybrid court cleared most civil backlog but criminal caseload now strains system

Judge Elton Mathis told the Waller County Commissioners Court on Wednesday that Waller County Court at Law No. 2—created by the Texas Legislature in 2023—has resolved most of the county’s civil backlog but is now struggling under a surge of criminal cases that threatens earlier progress.

Mathis, the court’s first appointed and later elected judge, said the hybrid court resolved roughly 97% of the civil, probate and family backlog it inherited from Sept. 2023, and disposed of 90% of the district-court civil backlog assigned to it. But he told commissioners the criminal docket has not recovered: since Jan. 1, 2025 he reported roughly 1,150 new misdemeanor cases assigned to his court and only about 12–20% of those have been resolved in the eight months since most criminal work began arriving there.

The judge said county-level criminal matters remain “in intensive care.” He told commissioners the court resolved 66% of the total backlog he received across courts in two years but that the pace…