John E. Bardgett

This case concerned a paternity action brought by a mother and her minor child against the alleged father, seeking a declaration of paternity along with child support and custody. The trial court denied the father's timely request for a jury trial, conducted a bench trial, and ruled that he was the father. On appeal, the Missouri Supreme Court reversed and remanded, holding that the proceeding is governed by the Declaratory Judgment Act (Chapter 527), which entitles parties to a jury trial on factual issues such as paternity under § 527.090. The court reasoned that prior cases confirm declaratory judgment actions as the proper vehicle for determining paternity and related support obligations, unlike proceedings under the juvenile code or dissolution statutes where jury trials are not authorized.

family lawprocedure

In State v. Mansfield, the defendant was convicted by a jury of second-degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment after the body of the victim was discovered on February 10, 1980. The dispositive issue on appeal was the trial court's refusal to allow a defense alibi witness, Geneva Abbott, to testify because the defense had not disclosed her in advance as required by Rule 25.05(A)(5). The Missouri Supreme Court reversed the conviction and remanded for a new trial, holding that the exclusion of this material and relevant testimony was fundamentally unfair and constituted prejudicial error. The court reasoned that any potential prejudice to the state from the nondisclosure could have been addressed through less drastic means, such as allowing the state to recall the defendant and other witnesses for further cross-examination, rather than barring the witness entirely. The court also rejected the defendant's other claims regarding jury composition and jury instructions.

criminal lawprocedure

The case concerned Walter Junior Blair's appeal from his conviction for capital murder and death sentence after he was hired by Larry Jackson, an inmate facing rape charges, to kill the victim Kathy Jo Allen so she could not testify against Jackson. Blair was released from jail, surveilled the victim, entered her apartment, robbed her and her boyfriend at gunpoint, and then shot her to death after forcing her to drive away. The Missouri Supreme Court reviewed alleged trial errors and the death sentence, addressing issues including the admissibility of the defendant's confession referencing his prior incarceration and reputation, jury instructions on capital murder, and whether an invalid aggravating circumstance would require reversal of the death penalty. The court considered these matters in light of precedents like Zant v. Stephens and ultimately upheld the conviction and sentence based on the sufficiency of the evidence and lack of prejudicial error.

criminal lawprocedure

In State v. Mannon, the defendant was convicted by a jury of conventional second-degree murder after fatally shooting Ricky Brooks at a bar following a day of heavy drinking, and he appealed on the ground that the trial court improperly instructed the jury on intoxication. The Missouri Supreme Court held that conventional second-degree murder requires proof of the specific intent to kill or do serious bodily harm, making the mental-state element of acting purposely or knowingly an essential part of the offense. The court reasoned that under § 562.076, evidence of voluntary intoxication may be considered by the jury to determine whether the defendant possessed the necessary mental state, and therefore the trial court's instruction stating that intoxication is never a defense, combined with its refusal to give the proper MAI-CR intoxication instruction, was prejudicial error. The judgment was reversed and the case remanded for a new trial.

criminal law

This case involved the conviction of Mitchell Gresham for first-degree murder based on robbery in Missouri, resulting in a life sentence. On appeal, the defendant challenged the jury panel selection process in Pulaski County, arguing it did not comply with state statutes requiring a pool of at least 400 qualified jurors selected from townships proportionally and drawn via a mixed box method. The court found that the jury commissioners violated these statutes by maintaining a smaller pool, using questionnaires in files rather than a box, and allowing subjective excusals, which deprived the defendant of a properly selected impartial jury. Consequently, the Missouri Supreme Court reversed the conviction and remanded for a new trial.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved appellant Eugene C. Kirk's conviction by a jury of first-degree robbery and his sentencing to life imprisonment as a persistent and dangerous offender. Kirk appealed, challenging the denial of his motion to suppress identification evidence from a showup and lineup on grounds that his detention lacked probable cause and the procedures were impermissibly suggestive, along with claims about improper jury communications and sentencing authority. The court affirmed the conviction, holding that the initial detention was justified by reasonable suspicion during a stolen vehicle investigation, the subsequent arrest was supported by probable cause from a victim's identification, and the identifications were not suggestive. Other points regarding jury deliberations and the applicable sentencing statute were overruled for lack of prejudice or error.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved Ricky Lee Wells, who was charged with second-degree murder in the death of Gary Pierce but convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to ten years in prison. On appeal, Wells challenged several trial court rulings, including the failure to grant a mistrial for nondisclosure of evidence and improper jury instructions given after extended deliberations. The Missouri Supreme Court reversed the conviction and remanded for a new trial, finding that the combination of giving MAI-CR2d 4.50 and MAI-CR2d 1.10 after prolonged jury deliberations, without providing a written copy of the latter instruction as required by court rules, had a coercive effect on the jury.

criminal lawprocedure

In State v. Olson, the defendant was convicted by a jury of rape, sodomy, and first-degree assault for abducting a woman at gunpoint, sexually assaulting her multiple times at a cabin, and stabbing and shooting her before leaving her for dead; he received consecutive life sentences. On appeal, the defendant argued that the charges violated double jeopardy protections under the U.S. and Missouri constitutions because the acts formed a single continuous course of conduct under section 556.041(4), and that the trial court erred by not instructing the jury on lesser-included assault offenses. The Missouri Supreme Court affirmed the convictions and sentences, holding that the three distinct offenses could be separately prosecuted and punished even when committed in one transaction, that section 556.046 did not require lesser-included instructions absent an evidentiary basis for acquitting on the greater offense while convicting on the lesser, and that the defendant had not requested such instructions.

criminal law

This case was a writ of prohibition action brought by an insurance reciprocal exchange and two of its policyholders to bar a St. Louis circuit judge from proceeding on uninsured-motorist claims filed there by other policyholders who resided elsewhere. The underlying suits sought damages under policies issued by the exchange, an unincorporated association, and the plaintiffs attempted to obtain jurisdiction by suing representative members as a class under Rule 52.10 and by alleging the exchange maintained an office in the city. The Missouri Supreme Court held that §§ 379.650–.800, RSMo, give exchanges entity status for litigation purposes by authorizing service of process on the director of insurance under § 379.680, thereby displacing class-action suits against individual subscribers; service on the two named members therefore conferred no jurisdiction over the exchange. The court made the writ absolute as to the individual relators, left service and venue questions for remand, and quashed the writ in all other respects.

procedurebusiness & regulatory

In State v. Chandler, the defendant was charged with second-degree burglary under Missouri law after entering an apartment occupied by four students, where he and two companions assaulted the occupants while seeking a Black person to harm. The trial court, sitting without a jury, found the defendant guilty based on evidence that he knowingly entered without license or privilege and did so with the intent to commit assault inside. The Missouri Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, holding that circumstantial evidence of the group's coordinated actions, statements during the incident, and the completed assaults sufficiently proved the required knowledge of unlawful entry and criminal intent at the time of entry. The court rejected challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence and the information's allegations regarding the intended assault.

criminal law

This case concerned a divorced wife's attempt to enforce child support arrearages through garnishment after the ex-husband stopped payments, with the husband moving to quash on grounds that the 1970 support judgment was conclusively presumed paid under the ten-year statute of limitations in § 516.350 RSMo 1978. The trial court granted the motion to quash because no payment had been recorded on the judgment within ten years. The Missouri Supreme Court reversed and remanded, holding that prior precedent had incorrectly treated periodic child-support orders like ordinary money judgments and that the newly enacted S.B. 468 (adding subsection 2 to § 516.350) should be applied to this still-pending litigation to provide a uniform rule that each periodic payment has its own ten-year period. The court reached this result without addressing the constitutional challenges to the prior statute.

family lawprocedure

This case concerns the interpretation of a maintenance provision in a 1979 divorce decree between Wallace and Guyetta Payne, under which Wallace was to pay $120 weekly plus 15% of his prior-year gross income minus $6,240, payable quarterly. Guyetta moved to hold Wallace in contempt for failing to make the supplemental payments, and the trial court adopted her calculation method (subtract $6,240 from gross income, then multiply the remainder by 15%), rejected Wallace's alternative method, determined specific amounts due, and held him in contempt. The Missouri Supreme Court affirmed the trial court's construction of the decree language and the amounts owed, holding that the agreement itself supplied sufficient evidence and that the trial judge could reject Wallace's testimony about his understanding. However, the court reversed the contempt adjudication as premature, following Keltner v. Keltner, because the exact amounts due must be adjudicated before contempt sanctions can issue. The conviction for contempt was reversed and the remainder of the judgment affirmed.

family lawprocedure

The case involved a defendant convicted by jury on three counts arising from a 1976 robbery and attempted robbery at a St. Louis cleaners, where one victim was killed: attempted first-degree robbery of Benjamin Johnson, first-degree robbery of Claude Robinson, and first-degree felony murder of Johnson based on the attempted robbery. On appeal, the Missouri Supreme Court reversed the attempted robbery conviction, holding that it was a lesser included offense of the felony murder and that double jeopardy principles bar convictions for both the underlying felony and the murder. The court affirmed the robbery and murder convictions, finding no double jeopardy violation for the separate robbery of the second victim and no prejudice from issues related to witness endorsement, the information's allegations, suppression of statements, or lack of a preliminary hearing on the amended count.

criminal lawprocedure

In State v. Cook, the defendant was convicted of first-degree robbery after tellers identified him and he gave a signed confession following police questioning. The key issue was whether the trial court erred by allowing a police officer to testify that two witnesses had identified the defendant's photo, which the defendant argued was inadmissible hearsay under State v. Degraffenreid that improperly bolstered the identification evidence. The Missouri Supreme Court held that the testimony was not hearsay because it was introduced not to prove the truth of the identifications but to show what the officer told the defendant, which was relevant to explaining the circumstances and voluntariness of his subsequent confession. The court therefore found no error in admitting the evidence and affirmed the conviction and sentence.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved a suit by respondent James Labrier against Anheuser Ford, Inc. and Gerald Zeiser alleging slander in count I and failure to issue a proper service letter under Missouri statute in count II. A jury awarded damages on both counts, but the defendants appealed only the judgment on count II regarding the service letter. The Supreme Court of Missouri, after transfer from the court of appeals, determined that the notice of appeal was timely filed on December 20, 1978, based on the record of the docket fee deposit and related ministerial acts by the clerk, despite some inconsistencies in stamping and entries. The court reasoned that filing occurs upon delivery and acceptance by the proper officer, allowing the appeal to proceed despite the late transcript filing issue raised in dissent.

procedurelabor & employmenttorts & liability

This case was a prohibition action brought by a Missouri prosecutor challenging a trial judge's dismissal of an armed criminal action count against a defendant also charged with second-degree robbery based on the same incident involving use of a gun. The judge had dismissed the armed criminal action charge under prior state precedent finding a double jeopardy violation from prosecuting both offenses together. The Supreme Court examined the statutory elements and punishments for each offense under Missouri law, along with U.S. Supreme Court guidance in Albernaz v. United States, and considered whether both charges could be filed and tried in a single case. The court held that the state could charge and proceed on both counts, as the offenses were distinct despite their factual overlap and the armed criminal action statute's language treating its penalty as additional to the underlying felony.

criminal law

The case involved three companies—Boyd-Richardson, American Cyanamid, and St. Louis Banana & Tomato—that paid merchants’ and manufacturers’ license taxes under protest in 1979 and sought refunds, claiming the taxes violated provisions of the Missouri Constitution regarding uniformity of taxation and unauthorized exemptions. The trial courts dismissed the claims or ruled in favor of the tax collectors, and the Missouri Supreme Court affirmed those judgments. The court reasoned that the protests by some plaintiffs lacked the required specificity under the protest statute, and that the tax statutes did not violate the constitutional requirements of uniformity or the prohibition on certain exemptions, as the small manufacturers' provision did not create an unauthorized exemption.

taxespropertybusiness & regulatory

This case concerned two police officers employed by the City of Eureka, a fourth-class Missouri municipality, who were dismissed without cause or a hearing pursuant to a state statute authorizing the mayor, with board approval, to remove appointive officers at will. The officers sued, claiming the statute violated equal protection by denying them the pre-dismissal hearings afforded to police in first-class charter counties and other city classes, especially given their required compliance with county-specific training standards. The trial court agreed and enjoined the city from proceeding without hearings, but the Missouri Supreme Court reversed, ruling that the statute does not deny equal protection. The court reasoned that fourth-class cities are treated uniformly statewide regardless of location, the training requirement creates no relevant classification mandating hearings, and the officers had no protected property interest in their positions when the layoff was for budgetary reasons and not constitutionally improper grounds.

civil rightslabor & employmentcriminal law

In this child custody modification case, the mother appealed the trial court's decision awarding primary custody to the father after the divorce, arguing error in the court's in camera interview with the minor children without creating a record as required by statute. The Missouri Supreme Court reversed the judgment and remanded for a new trial, holding that the statutory requirement under § 452.385 to record such interviews is mandatory. The court reasoned that without a record, meaningful appellate review is precluded as to the children's statements or the trial court's reliance on them in determining custody, and the children's welfare is the overriding concern that prevents finding waiver from the attorneys' failure to object.

family lawprocedure

The case involved a dispute over unpaid alimony and child support from a 1973 divorce decree, where the ex-wife sought to hold the ex-husband in contempt and enforce payment through motions filed in 1976. The Missouri Supreme Court determined that the alimony award was decretal rather than contractual, affirmed the judgment for arrears amounting to $15,665.46 plus attorney's fees, but reversed the contempt conviction and jail sentence. The court reasoned that a 1976 precedent allowing imprisonment for nonpayment of alimony did not apply retroactively to decrees entered before that decision, as it would be inequitable given the parties' expectations at the time of the agreement. The agreement's language specifying 'statutory alimony' supported its decretal nature.

family lawprocedure