Benson v. State

611 S.W.2d 538, 1980 Mo. App. LEXIS 3536
Missouri Court of Appeals·Decided December 30, 1980·No. WD 31465·Published·Cited by 103 cases

Opinion

DIXON, Judge.

This appeal from the denial of post-conviction relief pursuant to Rule 27.26 is one of a series involving the application of the rulings in Duren v. Missouri, 439 U.S. 357, 99 S.Ct. 664, 58 L.Ed.2d 579 (1979), and Lee v. Missouri, 439 U.S. 461, 99 S.Ct. 710, 58 L.Ed.2d 736 (1979).

The precise issue raised is the application of Duren v. Missouri to cases tried between January 9, 1975, the date when Taylor v. Louisiana, 419 U.S. 522, 95 S.Ct. 692, 42 L.Ed.2d 690 (1975), was decided, and September 27, 1977, the date when State v. Duren, 556 S.W.2d 11 (Mo. banc 1977), was decided. The question is posed because of the decision in Lee v. Missouri which mandates application of the Duren v. Missouri, holding to all juries sworn after the Taylor v. Louisiana holding. This appeal and seven other such cases were heard by a special panel of seven judges. All the appeals were heard at the same time with argument limited to the Duren issues raised.

All the cases have as a common thread an attack upon the composition of Jackson County jury panels as being unconstitutionally faulty by reason of an underrepresenta *540 tion of women. The underrepresentation of women occurred by reason of the manner in which the questionnaire process provided by § 497.130 RSMo 1969 operated to exclude females by inviting and almost directing their nonparticipation in the jury system. This questionnaire and its operation was confined to juries selected in Jackson County, and the factual background of Duren v. Missouri and Lee v. Missouri, supra, inextricably involves the application and effect of § 497.130 RSMo 1969.

Soon after the decision in Taylor v. Louisiana, supra, the public defender’s office in Jackson County launched an attack upon the method of selection of juries in Jackson County. The attack was focused in State v. Lee, 556 S.W.2d 25 (Mo. banc 1977), and State v. Duren, 556 S.W.2d 11 (Mo. banc 1977). The evidentiary support for the attack in both of these cases hinged upon the effect which the questionnaire provided by § 497.130 RSMo 1969 had in eliminating females from the jury list. After the evi-dentiary support for the challenge was compiled for use in State v. Lee for the 1975 panel, the “packet” of such information was provided to all assistant public defenders in January, 1976.

State v. Duren and State v. Lee, supra, reached the Supreme Court of Missouri in 1977, and were both decided September 27, 1977. The claims of both defendants as to the underrepresentation of women on Jackson County juries were rejected by the Missouri Supreme Court. Ultimately, the Supreme Court of the United States, in Duren v. Missouri, supra, decided January 9, 1979, accepted the defendant’s contention. Lee v. Missouri, supra, decided January 15,1979, made the Duren ruling retroactive to the date of decision in Taylor v. Louisiana.

The result of these two decisions of the Supreme Court was to open the floodgates to a variety of claims for similar relief by prisoners who had been convicted by Jackson County juries after Taylor v. Louisiana.

Duren v. Missouri and Lee v. Missouri were direct appeal cases in which the error had been fully preserved. These cases and others in the same procedural posture were granted relief by memorandum order in compliance with the mandate of the Supreme Court of the United States. State v. Clark, 583 S.W.2d 300 (Mo.App.1979); State v. Hardy, 578 S.W.2d 361 (Mo.App.1979).

Varieties of procedural default began to emerge in the appeals of other cases. State v. Buford, 582 S.W.2d 298 (Mo.App.1979), rejected the State’s attack upon the statistical proof offered to show a Duren violation, which asserted that the ultimate composition of the wheel was not proven. The rationale of Buford — that a fact pattern, once established, continues in the absence of evidence to the contrary—was relied upon in State v. Hawkins, 582 S.W.2d 333 (Mo.App.1979), and State v. Beavers, 591 S.W.2d 215 (Mo.App.1979) to find Duren violations where the factual data offered to support the motion were for a prior- year’s jury panel. Thus, the principle of Buford, that facts once shown are presumed to continue to exist when the system giving rise to the operative facts is shown not to have changed, was applied and broadened.

In a case where a motion to quash the jury panel was filed, but no ruling was made, relief was also granted, State v. Carter, 591 S.W.2d 219 (Mo.App.1979), this on the basis that the ruling in State v. Duren would have made insistence upon such a ruling futile. Finally, in State v. Williams, 595 S.W.2d 378 (Mo.App.1980), a case was reached where no attempt had been made to assert the error procedurally in the trial court, but the issue was raised in the appeal as plain error. Relief was granted under the plain error rule, and the circle was complete.

Only two exceptions were saved: first, the holding of State v. Mountjoy, 585 S.W.2d 98 (Mo.App.1979), that plain error would not be applied to such a claim where the trial occurred prior to the decision in State v. Duren, a holding which is here affirmed; and, likewise, the holding in State v. Williamson, 584 S.W.2d 628 (Mo.App.1979), that error raised for the first time on appeal would not be considered, absent a request for plain error review. Williams, supra, has been adopted and fol *541 lowed in State v. Johnson, 606 S.W.2d 624 (Mo.banc 1980), and in State v. Baker, 607 S.W.2d 153 (Mo. banc 1980), and must be considered as settled law.

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Benson v. State, 611 S.W.2d 538, 1980 Mo. App. LEXIS 3536 (Mo. Ct. App. 1980).

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