Appeals Court 'roadshow' comes to Northwest

There was some courtroom drama on the campus of Northwest Missouri State University Monday as a Court of Appeals panel for the Western District of Missouri heard oral arguments from attorneys in the J.S. Jones Student Union Ballroom.

It was the fourth time in five years the court, which usually convenes in Kansas City, has brought its "roadshow" to Northwest in an attempt to give the public a chance to experience high-level justice first hand.

Similar events are held at other college campuses across the region, including William Jewell College in Liberty and the University of Central Missouri in Warrensburg.

The Western District court, which has 11 judges altogether, hears appeals from trial courts in 45 counties that embrace all of northwest Missouri and most of the central portion of the state. Eastern and southern appeals districts are based in St. Louis and Springfield.

Judge Joseph M. Ellis presided over Monday's session. He was joined on the bench by Western District colleague Gary Witt and Missouri Supreme Court Judge Zel Fischer, a native of Rockport who has filled in before when the appellate panel meets in Maryville.

All three cases before the court dealt with criminal trials in which procedural matters or supposed legal miscues created sufficient cause for review. Unlike circuit courts, which determine innocence or guilt, the Missouri Court of Appeals decides if the original trial was held in accordance with the state Constitution or if a defendant's rights were adequately protected.

And its word is usually final. Only a small fraction of cases move on to the Supreme Court in Jefferson City.

"The idea that 'We'll take this all the way to the Supreme Court' is something of a misnomer," Fischer said during a question-and-answer session with Northwest students. "For most cases this is the court of last resort."

Watching the judges hear oral arguments is a little like looking at an iceberg, a lot of the real work is invisible. Before attorneys address the court, the judges have already spent a good deal of time reading briefs and reviewing transcripts, pleadings and exhibits.

Though all the attorneys appearing before the trio of judges Monday came well prepared to state their case, few of them did so without being peppered with questions from the bench. Miller said the process is often more about filling in the blanks than gaining new information or insight about the case.

"Oral arguments are really the last chance for me to ask attorneys about the questions their briefs didn't satisfy me on," Miller said.

Ellis told students that despite nearly 200 years of legal precedents since Missouri became a state, cases before the Court of Appeals remain as varied as ever.

"You would think that about every point of law there is has been decided, but that is far from the case," said Ellis, who, by way of example, noted that smart phones and the Internet have created huge legal questions only beginning to be answered.

"This is a constantly developing system of law that we have," he said. "It seems like there is no end to the types of cases that can arise."

The three cases before the court in Maryville were all low-tech, however. The first involved the standing in court of affidavits filed by confidential informants rather than peace officers.

The second argument related to a suspect's refusal to talk to police prior to his arrest, and the possibility that his silence contributed to his conviction in violation of the U.S. Constitution's guarantee against self-incrimination.

A third appeal had to do with questions about a driving-while-intoxicated conviction in which the defendant perhaps became impaired between the time his vehicle broke down and officers arrived on the scene. The lawyer advocating for overturning the verdict argued that the original defense attorney failed to object to "an improper legal conclusion" drawn by the prosecution.