According to court records, Ken Paxton, Texas Attorney General allegedly fled his own home on Monday morning to avoid being served a subpoena for a federal court hearing on Tuesday in a lawsuit from non-profit organizations that provide Texans with funds for abortions out of state. Since then, Paxton has denied the incident.
Ernesto Martin Herrera, a process server, claims that on Monday morning he approached Texas Attorney General’s McKinney home to serve him with the subpoena. According to the court document, Herrera was first received by State Senator Angela Paxton who informed him Paxton was taking a phone call and was unavailable, to which Herrera said he’d wait.
“At approximately 9:40 a.m., the garage door opened up and I saw Mr. Paxton exiting the garage,” reads the court records. “I walked up the driveway approaching Mr. Paxton and called him by his name. As soon as he saw me and heard me call his name out, he turned around and ran back inside the house.” Next, Herrera recounted how Mrs. Paxton boarded the black Chevrolet truck parked in the driveway and started it. “A few minutes later I saw Mr. Paxton run from the door inside the garage towards the rear door behind the driver's side.”
When Herrera realized Paxton was not taking the subpoena, he yelled at the attorney general that he was serving him with legal documents and left them on the ground, where they stayed after Paxton left in his car.
According to The Texas Tribune, Paxton filed a motion to quash the subpoena later on Monday and also requested the certificates of service to be sealed, which included the affidavit that recorded the whole ordeal. On Tuesday, a few hours after the affidavit was published, U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman granted both motions.
On Tuesday, Paxton responded to these allegations in an official statement on Twitter saying that he’s being attacked for being concerned about a stranger loitering around his home, calling the process server's attempt to give him the documents a political stunt. The Texas Tribune reported that Paxton’s lawyers contended that the server had lingered at the attorney general’s house for over an hour accosting Paxton and his wife.
In case you missed it, here's Local Profile's report on scammers using Texas attorney general's name to access information.