Missouri Supreme Court Archives

Missouri law licenses suspended for former prosecutors involved in cover-up of police assault

August 13, 2019 By Brian Hauswirth

The Missouri Supreme Court has ruled that two former St. Louis assistant prosecutors violated rules of professional conduct, for their role in a 2014 cover-up of an illegal police assault in St. Louis.

The state Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion on Tuesday, that former St. Louis assistant circuit attorneys Ambry Schuessler and Katherine Dierdorf violated the rules of professional conduct.

The opinion, which is written by Judge Patricia Breckenridge, says the severity of the dishonesty of Schuessler and Dierdorf warranted the suspension of their law licenses. The two admitted to withholding their knowledge of a police detective’s beating of a suspect, and of a fellow assistant circuit attorney’s filing of false charges against the suspect.

Dierdorf’s law license has been suspended for three years, Schuessler for two years.

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case in January.

“Hailey’s Law” to become law in Missouri

July 16, 2019 By Brian Hauswirth

Legislation requiring Missouri’s Amber Alert System Oversight Committee to meet at least annually has been signed into law by Governor Mike Parson.

State Rep. Curtis Trent, R-Springfield, speaks on the Missouri House floor on May 16, 2019 in Jefferson City (file photo courtesy of Tim Bommel at House Communications)

State Rep. Curtis Trent, R-Springfield, filed “Hailey’s Law” in response to the 2014 kidnapping, rape and killing of ten-year-old Hailey Owens in Springfield. Trent notes the oversight committee hasn’t met since 2015.

“And I think in the case of a very sensitive public safety issue like this there should be at least annual meetings to make sure we’re reviewing the Amber Alert System, that we’re identifying any new technologies,” Trent says.

51-year-old Craig Wood was convicted of first degree murder and has been sentenced to death, for killing Owens. Wood’s father, Jim, testified in April that Hailey’s life could have been saved if the Amber Alert was issued earlier.

Representative Trent tells Missourinet annual meetings will help identify any new procedures that should be used to ensure alerts are issued quickly.

“Because we know the statistics have shown, the data shows, that time is critical when you have a missing person,” says Trent.

The law, which takes effect in August, requires the Amber Alert System to be integrated into the Missouri Uniform Law Enforcement System (MULES).

Trent, who was first elected to the Missouri House in 2016, has sponsored the bill for three years. It has the support of both House Speaker Elijah Haahr, R-Springfield, and House Minority Leader Crystal Quade, D-Springfield. The murder happened in Quade’s district.

The bill also allows the oversight committee to include a representative from the outdoor advertising industry. Supporters say digital highway signs can be very effective.

Wood, who’s currently incarcerated in Potosi, is appealing his death sentence. The Missouri Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case in April. The court has not issued an opinion yet.

Jim Wood and Hailey’s father, Markus, testified together during April’s hearing. They sat together in the hearing room. Both men attended Thursday’s bill-signing in Governor Parson’s office in Jefferson City.

Daughter spared when Richard Strong killed her mother, half-sister, asks Missouri governor to block his execution

June 8, 2015 By Mike Lear

The daughters of a man Missouri plans to execute Tuesday for killing his girlfriend and her 2-year-old daughter want his life spared, even though one of them was there the night of the murders.

Alyshia ,Richard, and Lauren Strong during a visit at the state prison in Potosi.

Richard Strong brutally stabbed and slashed 23-year-old Eva Washington and her 2-year-old daughter, Zandrea Thomas, to death after an argument in October of 2000. When police arrived they found the couple’s 3-month-old daughter sitting on a bed next to a pool of blood and a knife.

That daughter, Alyshia Strong, is now 14, and she is asking Governor Jay Nixon (D) to stop her father from being executed Tuesday evening. She knows some people might find that hard to understand.

“My dad is the only parent I have,” Strong told Missourinet. “I live with my grandma and she’s an amazing … she’s been amazing raising me … but my dad is my dad.”

Alyshia’s half-sister Lauren Strong, 18 and also Richard Strong’s daughter, says in spite of his having been in prison most of their lives, he has been active as their father.

“In any way he could possibly have been a part of my life, he was,” Lauren said.

The two young ladies have presented Nixon with a request for clemency for Strong. Neither daughter denies his crime or attempts to excuse it, but both say he would be punished enough if he spent the rest of his life in prison and say it would only punish them to execute him.

Lauren Strong was four at the time of the murders. She says she likes to think she knows who he is now, “or on some level, the reasons why he did what he did, and I’m not going to make any excuses. It was horrible. But it’s not for anybody else to, without sounding cliché, play God.

“There is nothing good that would come out of his execution. Absolutely not one thing I can think of that’s good. But there are a hundred bad things I can think of,” Lauren added.

In the clemency request Alyshia writes that she never asked him about the night of the murders until his execution date was set by the Missouri Supreme Court in April. She told Missourinet she put it off because she wanted to protect his feelings.

“But, if my father was going to die, I needed to know everything. I needed closure. I needed to know what happened because I didn’t want him to leave and me not be able to find out,” she said.

According to her statement in the request, he told her Washington had been abused as a child, had Multiple Personality Disorder, and said his relationship with Washington was volatile.

Eva Washington was 23 when she was murdered by Richard Strong in October, 2000. Court documents say she was stabbed 21 times, with five slash wounds, and the tip of the knife used to stab her was embedded in her skull.

“He didn’t mean to hurt anybody and he’s very sorry,” she told Missourinet. “I’m at peace now but I would rather him live than to die for something that [he] didn’t mean to happen.”

She said in her statement she still isn’t ready to ask why he spared her on the night of the murders, and hopes he won’t be executed so some day, she can.

Strong’s mother, Joyce Knox, is Alyshia’s legal guardian. She says Richard Strong calls Alyshia two or three times a week.

“I know they talk about important things – the same kinds of things a father would talk to his daughter about if he were living at home with her,” she writes in her statement in the clemency request. “Even though he is in prison, Richard is a very good father – he always has been.”

“At one time Richard was going to church with me, and by me being a minister he thought that he could go to Heaven off of mama’s coattails, but I know now that Richard has truly found God in his life,” Knox told Missourinet. “And he’s helped a lot of other people that are in prison with him to find God and he’s changed so much.”

She added tearfully, “I don’t want to see him die.”

Two-year-old Zandrea Thomas was stabbed nine times and had 12 slash wounds inflicted by Richard Strong.

Nixon has heard from the families, attorneys, and friends of some of the other men that have been executed in Missouri since late 2013 that those men had found religion and were positive influences on those with them in prison, as well as claims regarding some of those men’s competency to be executed – one of the claims raised now by Strong’s attorneys in seeking to keep him from being executed. Nixon has also been told that some of those men were abused as children, as has been said of Strong. None of those arguments has dissuaded Nixon from allowing any given to proceed.

Strong’s attorneys are seeking to block his execution on several other fronts, as well, including arguing that the jury was not properly instructed in how it had to consider the factors that prosecutors raised as arguments that he should receive the death penalty.

If those efforts ultimately fail, Strong will die by lethal injection at the state prison at Bonne Terre between Tuesday at 6 p.m. and Wednesday at 5:59 p.m. His would be the fourth execution carried out in Missouri this year and the 16th since Missouri resumed conducting executions on a regular basis, and began scheduling one per month in November, 2013.

Attempts to reach the family of Eva Washington and Zandrea Thomas for this story have been unsuccessful.

Supreme Court hears gun rights amendment arguments

July 15, 2014 By Mike Lear

The Missouri Supreme Court has heard arguments on whether what appears on next month’s ballot about a proposed gun rights amendment says all it should say.

The Missouri Supreme Court Building in Jefferson City

The Court has been asked to consider whether the title and ballot summary that voters will see next month for Constitutional Amendment 5 tells them enough about what it will do by making gun rights “unalienable.”

Attorney Chuck Hatfield asks whether voters know that would mean holding those rights to the highest legal scrutiny.

“Saying ‘unalienable’ tells us nothing,” argues Hatfield. “It tells the voters nothing about the change that we’re making to the Constitution.”

Senator Kurt Schaefer (R-Columbia), an attorney, sponsored the measure in the legislature. He argues to the Court that it would put Missouri in line with rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court.

“It’s an individual right that is unalienable. It gets the highest level of review from this court,” says Schaefer. “Basically when this court is presented with those questions, and I can’t speculate on those, what they would be, but it is going to be a decision for this court of what meets that standard and what does not.”

Read the ballot language (scroll down to “Constitutional Amendment 5”)

Attorneys for the state and the backers of the ballot language say the challenge should be tossed out because of a statutory deadline barring changes to ballots within six weeks before an election, and say that absentee ballots have already been cast. They say those ballots could be invalidated if the issue’s language is changed.

Hatfield says it isn’t the job of the Supreme Court to worry about those ballots.

“If this measure passes 70 [percent] to 30 [percent] it won’t matter. If this measure fails 70 [percent] to 30 [percent] it won’t matter,” argues Hatfield. “If it’s close it’s going to matter and we may be back [in front of the Supreme Court], but today it doesn’t matter.”

Additionally, Hatfield says if his clients’ case against that language is ruled to be moot, they will have been disenfranchised because he could not have acted earlier.

“The reason we got here when we did, the reason we got to the trial court before 60 days, is because everyone doubletimed it,” says Hatfield. “The Secretary of State issued their certification early, the Auditor issued their summary statement early, we filed suit on the afternoon of the day that the Secretary certified the initiative, we were in court on the next business day. Your honor, if this case is moot, I don’t know what else to do for my clients.”

The Court is also asked to consider, if it decides ballot language is inadequate, whether it can provide new language or whether it can simply remove the issue from the ballot altogether.

It could issue a ruling at any time.

Death penalty opponent, analyst consider reasons for limit to MO executions

July 8, 2014 By Mike Lear

The Corrections Department asked the State Supreme Court not to ask it to carry out more than one execution per month. The Supreme Court has honored that request and changed its own rules to reflect it.

Missouri executed two inmates at the same time on four occasions in its gas chamber between 1938 and 1953. (photo courtesy; Adam Roberts)

A Corrections spokesman hasn’t acknowledged the request was made, but some who watch how the death penalty is carried out in Missouri have ideas why it was made.

Rita Linhardt chairs the board of Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. She thinks one group the change would benefit would be the Corrections Department’s employees.

“The people down at Bonne Terre who are actually carrying out the executions,” Linhardt refers to specifically. “I would imagine that an execution is very disruptive to the normal prison routine, and so I would think the DOC needs time to prepare for this not just only logistically but also emotionally … so I would think this ruling of having no more than one a month would help in some way those type of burdens on DOC workers.”

A spokesman at the Missouri Correctional Officers Association says it has no comment on the rule change.

Linhardt thinks the one-per-month limit could also benefit attorneys who represent clients who are under a death sentence, who often represent multiple clients.

“They don’t even one want one (execution) a month, but the possibility that you could be facing two of your clients in the same month … I just think would be terribly emotionally draining,” says Linhardt.

Attorney John Mills is an attorney participating in a Saint Louis University law school study of the death penalty in Missouri. He says the Department could be sensing that Missourians’ limits would be tested by more frequent executions.

“The public may have a limit in what they will tolerate in terms of executions, and (the Department) may be feeling some pressure or may sense that the public may not be willing to tolerate more than one execution per month,” Mills tells Missourinet.

Mills concedes that it could be a matter of budgeting or staffing for the Department that makes multiple executions in a month too taxing on resources, though a Department spokesman declined to comment on whether that is a factor.

The rule change was ordered by Chief Justice Mary R. Russell. No commentary was provided explaining the rationale behind it.

Missouri currently has 41 men under a death sentence, meaning it would take at least three-and-a-half years for Missouri to execute all the men currently sentenced to death in the state.

Even before the rule took effect Missouri has been scheduling one execution every month since November 2013, with only one having been blocked by the courts. Executions have been scheduled to take place July 16 and August 6.

Missouri has not historically placed such limits on executions, though the last time two inmates were executed in the same month was in October, 2001, when Michael Roberts was executed on the October 3 and Stephen Johns was executed 21 days later.

On four occasions between 1938 and 1953 Missouri executed two people at the same time using lethal gas. Prior to 1938 when the state’s death penalty was carried out by hanging, sometimes two or more condemned individuals would be hung alongside each other.

Supreme Court throws Royals mascot hot dog throwing case back to lower court

June 24, 2014 By Mike Lear

A man hit in the eye with a hot dog thrown by the Royals mascot will have another chance to sue the team’s organization.

Kansas City Royals mascot Sluggerrr

The state Supreme Court has voided the decision of a jury that put the blame for the injury on the man, John Coomer. The Court says it should not have been left up to a jury to decide whether the risk of being injured by a thrown hot dog is inherent to watching a baseball game. It says that should be up to a court to decide.

The decision means the case could be retried.

Coomer was hit by a hot dog thrown by Sluggerrr at a game on September 8, 2009. He said he had to undergo surgery for a detached retina and a cataract and sued for damages, claiming negligence.

Legislature will try to get criminal code rewrite to Gov. Nixon next week

April 18, 2014 By Mike Lear

State lawmakers who have spent years crafting an update to Missouri’s system of criminal laws and punishments hope to send Governor Jay Nixon (D) a bill next week.

Representative Stanley Cox (courtesy; Missouri House Communications)

House and Senate versions of that rewrite were passed last week, and lawmakers in both chambers met this week to discuss differences between those versions and reach a compromise. They plan to attempt to make those changes to the Senate bill (SB 491) in a House committee, and get it through both chambers and to the Governor next week.

“We have a bill which is satisfactory to the sponsors in both houses,” says Representative Stanley Cox (R-Sedalia), the sponsor of the House legislation.

One of the major differences between the two versions dealt with penalties for first-time possession of small amounts of marijuana. The Senate version would eliminate jail time for possession of less than 35 grams of marijuana, while the House version would maintain the current penalty of up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.

Senator Jolie Justus (courtesy; Missouri Senate Communications)

Senator Jolie Justus (D-Kansas City) says the two sides struck a “tentative” compromise.

“We kept it so that if you have 35 or less grams of marijuana and it’s a first-time offense it’ll be a Class-A misdemeanor which is what it is now, but if you have 10 grams or less of marijuana and it’s a first-time offense then it will be moved to a Class-D misdemeanor, which is not going to be subject to jail time. It will be fine only.”

In response to concerns about the size of the legislation expressed by Governor Nixon, Senate lawmakers had removed some 400 pages that reclassified certain felonies and added a fifth level of felony offense. Justus says that will be restored.

“When we sat down and worked it out with the House members, frankly, we realized that cutting that out was kind of defeating the purpose of what we’d set out to do in the first place without really addressing the Governor’s issues,” says Justus.

The proposal will still come out smaller than the House’s more than 1000-page bill, though. Cox says that’s because those from his chamber agreed to remove language dealing with weapons penalties.

“There were lots of issues with that,” Cox says. “We thought it best not to try to address that. Some of it had to do with other legislation passing through the legislature this year.”

The bill still won’t be broken down into smaller pieces based on subject matter, which is what Nixon had indicated he wanted. Justus says lawmakers don’t feel that can be done.

Nixon says the size of the bill leaves too much room for error, and he dismisses legislators’ position that the bill will be vetted after passage by the Missouri Supreme Court and its effective date has been pushed back to 2017, to allow time for changes if necessary.

Justus and Cox both say if necessary, they think the legislature could overturn the Governor if he were to veto the bill.

“Obviously we’ll take a look at the veto message if there is one,” Justus says.

If the bill is sent to Nixon it would be the culmination of years of work for both lawmakers.

“The closer we get the more nervous I get,” Justus tells Missourinet, but adds she is confident the bill has been thoroughly vetted starting with its drafting by a Missouri Bar committee, followed by five years of committee work leading up to full chamber consideration.

Cox agrees. “I feel confident that we’ll get it done this year.”

Criminal code rewrite drafters respond to Gov. Nixon’s size concerns

March 31, 2014 By Mike Lear

Lawmakers that have been working on the rewrite of Missouri’s criminal code for years say this is still the year to get it passed, despite the reservations expressed by Governor Jay Nixon (D) about its size.

Senator Jolie Justus (courtesy; Missouri Senate Communications)

Nixon has suggested that the rewrite – currently more than 1,000 pages in length in the House version and down to about 700 pages in a Senate version revamped during the legislative spring break – be broken into sections and passed rather than one bill. The Governor is reportedly concerned that in a bill that size, mistakes could be made.

Senate President Pro Tem Tom Dempsey (R-St. Charles) has said he will not bring up the bill in that chamber until all parties decide how to proceed.

Senator Jolie Justus (D-Kansas City) says it’s frustrating for the Governor to raise this concern now.

“We’re always frustrated when we hear about any problem with a bill this late in,” says Justus. “I think that we have said for the last three years now that the biggest issue with this bill is its size. We are continuing to work with our fellow colleagues, we are continuing to have conversations with the Governor’s office about the nature of the bill, what’s in it, what’s not in it, and how we can get to a path to getting it passed because this is the year to get it done and we intend to do that.”

Representative Stanley Cox (R-Sedalia) says separating the issue out into several smaller bills would kill the proposal.

Representative Stanley Cox (courtesy; Missouri House Communications)

“There is no practical way of breaking it into sections,” says Cox. “It was essentially a five-year process … and three years actually it’s been filed in the Missouri General Assembly … and it was never designed to be broken into several pieces.”

Justus, however, doesn’t rule out taking the Governor’s suggestion.

“That is going to be a difficult row, but I never say, ‘never,’ on anything. We are looking at all options.”

The legislature could pass the rewrite legislation and if the Governor vetoes it, attempt to override the veto, but Cox doesn’t believe it would play out that way.

“It’s pretty hard to believe the Governor would veto legislation that not only has previously been vetted to such a high degree but also has built-in safety nets all over the place,” says Cox.

Senator Bob Dixon (courtesy; Missouri Senate Communications)

The “safety nets” Cox refers to include the effective date of the legislation, which lawmakers plan to push back to January 1, 2017. The Missouri Supreme Court’s Standing Committee on Criminal Procedure will review the bill after passage.

Cox notes Governor Nixon will also have time for the lawyers that work for him to review the bill after its passage.

“He’s got what I would consider a rather large law firm,” says Cox. “That’s what lawyers are paid to do, is look through complicated things and say if they’re good or bad, and the Governor is better capable of doing that than almost anybody I know.”

“I think we’ve addressed every concern that’s been raised substantively,” says Senator Bob Dixon (R-Springfield).

“What we are doing is saying that we are standing here ready, willing and able to negotiate, talk, do whatever we need to move this idea forward,” says Justus. “The time has come. In order for us to have an effective, responsible, safe criminal justice system, we need to get this done.”

“It’s great to accomodate the Governor if we can,” says Cox, “but my inclination is to take the code – what we have vetted in both legislative bodies – and try to pass it and deal with it that way.”

Another state lawmaker who has spent a great deal of time and effort on the criminal code is Representative Chris Kelly (D-Columbia), who offered an open letter to fellow legislators about the Governor’s position. See the story on that letter for what he had to say.

Rep. Kelly open letter to colleagues on reported position of Gov. Nixon on criminal code

March 27, 2014 By Mike Lear

Representative Chris Kelly (D-Columbia) has issued an open letter to fellow lawmakers regarding Governor Jay Nixon’s (D) reported position that he would veto the legislation moving through the legislature that would rewrite Missouri’s criminal code.

A Nixon spokesperson has reportedly said due to the size of the bill and the possibility that it includes mistakes, he would rather see it broken up into a series of bills and would not sign the current package, that has ranged between 700 and around 1000 pages at times through its development.

“Reasonable caution in Governors and Legislators-even legislators who are running for statewide office-is prudent,” writes Kelly, “We should not, however, allow political timidity to derail the passage of this long overdue, thoroughly vetted, and vital legislative reform.”

See Kelly’s letter

Kelly says in his letter committees and subcommittees in both chambers held numerous work sessions and hearings on the issue. The state Supreme Court has agreed to have its Standing Committee on Criminal Procedure review the bill after passage, and the bill has been drafted with a delayed effective date of January 1, 2016 that Kelly says he will propose pushing back a year. Altogether Kelly says the bill would be studied by the Supreme Court and the Governor and the legislature will have at least four chances to fix errors.

Kelly writes, “During my eighteen years in the General Assembly I have seen many long and complex bills but I have never seen one with this degree of initial vetting and post passage review. Mistakes are always possible but in this case the General Assembly and the Missouri Bar and Bench have done all that is reasonably possible to provide comfort to even the most timid politicians.

Three inmates’ attorneys argue against setting of their execution dates

February 24, 2014 By Mike Lear

Attorneys for three men sentenced to be executed have presented their arguments to the Missouri Supreme Court why it shouldn’t set a date for their executions. The Court ordered those attorneys to prepare those arguments in Show Cause orders issued in each case, January 29. The State Attorney General’s Office has responded to two of them.

Russell Bucklew, William Rousan and Cecil Clayton (photos courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

Among the arguments attorneys for William Rousan, Russell Bucklew and Cecil Clayton separately make is that because their clients are plaintiffs in Zink v. Lombardi, ongoing federal litigation regarding Missouri’s lethal injection process, their executions should not proceed until that has been settled. To this point, the Attorney General’s Office argues legal precedent that federal litigation is not a reason not to set an execution date. Joseph Franklin, Allen Nicklasson and Herbert Smulls were also plaintiffs in Zink v. Lombardi when they were executed in November, December and January, respectively.

Attorneys for Clayton argue that he is incompetent to understand his punishment due to a deteriorating mental state, in part because of a head injury 25 years before he fatally shot Berry County Sheriff’s Deputy Christopher Castetter in November, 1996. That injury at a sawmill resulted in the removal of part of the right frontal lobe of his brain. The Attorney General’s Office’s response to the arguments of Clayton’s attorneys is due March 5.

Attorneys for Bucklew, who in 1996 shot Michael Sanders, the presumed new boyfriend of his ex, say he suffers from malformed blood vessels that cause among other things, bleeding from his mouth and eyes, and could increase the risk of a painful or prolonged lethal injection. The state argues that doesn’t merit an indefinite delay in setting his execution date.

Rousan also claims instructions given to the jury at his trial were confusing; an issue the state says the Court and federal courts have already dealt with. Rousan, his son and brother participated in the murder of a rural Bonne Terre couple as part of a cattle theft and robbery.

Missouri is scheduled to carry out the execution by lethal injection of Michael Taylor early Wednesday morning. Taylor is one of two men sentenced to death after pleading guilty to the 1989 murder of 15-year-old Ann Harrison of Kansas City.

On Friday the State Supreme Court set March 26 as the date for the execution of Jeffrey Ferguson for the 1989 abduction, rape and murder of 17-year-old Kelli Hall in St. Louis County.

Both Ferguson and Taylor were among four men for whom the Supreme Court in December ordered attorneys to present arguments why their execution dates should not be set. The others of those four were Roderick Nunley and David Barnett. Nunley is the second man who plead guilty in the murder of Harrison. Barnett stabbed each of his grandparents more than 10 times at their Glendale home before stealing their car and $120 in cash.