Title: State Ex Rel. Reser v. Martin
Citation: 576 S.W.2d 289
Docket Number: 60639
State: Missouri
Issuer: Missouri Supreme Court
Date: December 18, 1978

576 S.W.2d 289 (1978)
STATE ex rel. Phyllis RESER, Director, Missouri Division of Family Services, Relator,
v.
Gene R. MARTIN, Judge, Circuit Court, 16th Judicial Circuit, Respondent.
No. 60639.

Supreme Court of Missouri, En Banc.
December 18, 1978.
Rehearing Denied February 13, 1979.
Richard Huber, Columbia, Edwin H. Steinmann, Jr., Div. of Family Services, Jefferson City, for relator.
Angela Bennett, Thomas M. Larson, Robert A. Simons, Kansas City, for respondent.
DONNELLY, Judge.
This is mandamus.
Phyllis J. Reser is the Director of the Missouri Division of Family Services. She seeks, by this writ, to compel respondent, a Circuit Court judge of the Sixteenth Judicial Circuit, to permit her to intervene in a contempt action brought by Carol Tyner against Donald Tyner to enforce court-ordered child support.
Child support payments of $375 per month were ordered when the Tyner marriage was dissolved in 1975. When Donald Tyner failed to make the payments and disappeared, Carol Tyner sought and received approximately $5,700 in AFDC and Medicaid benefits from the Division of Family Services under § 208.040, RSMo 1969. In addition to its other provisions, the statute provides:
Carol Tyner made an appointment with an employee of the Division for the purpose of assigning her rights to support to the Division under § 208.040.2. In October, 1977, approximately one week prior to the time Carol Tyner was to execute the assignment, child support investigators in the County Prosecuting Attorney's office located Donald Tyner. Carol Tyner then consulted *290 a private attorney, did not execute the assignment, withdrew from the AFDC program, and instituted the contempt action against Donald Tyner.
Relator moved to intervene in the contempt action under Rule 52.12(a) of the Rules of Civil Procedure. Rule 52.12(a) provides for intervention as of right and reads as follows:
Rule 52.12(a) is to be distinguished from Rule 52.12(b) which concerns permissive intervention. Relator claims clause (2) of Rule 52.12(a) is applicable. Relator asserts that the Division was a necessary party to the action in that to the extent the Division provided support, the Division is subrogated to any rights Carol Tyner has to support arrearages from Donald Tyner. Intervention was denied by respondent.
In State ex rel. University Bank v. Blair, 365 Mo. 699, 700, 285 S.W.2d 678, 679 (banc 1956), this Court stated the general rule to be "that mandamus will not lie if a specific and adequate remedy by appeal exists."
The determinative question then becomes whether an appeal may be taken from the denial of an application to intervene of right under Rule 52.12(a).
In State ex rel. Duggan v. Kirkwood, 357 Mo. 325, 337, 208 S.W.2d 257, 261 (banc 1948), this Court, in a situation where an applicant had a legal right to intervene but was denied the right by the trial court, declared that "mandamus is the proper remedy to afford relief to the applicant."
In City of St. Louis v. Silk, 239 Mo.App. 757, 763, 199 S.W.2d 23, 27 (1947), the St. Louis Court of Appeals said:
In Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen v. Baltimore &amp; Ohio Railroad Co., 331 U.S. 519, 524, 67 S. Ct. 1387, 1390, 91 L. Ed. 1646 (1947), Mr. Justice Murphy dealt with intervention of right under Rule 24(a) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and said:
We are persuaded that there should be a right of appeal from denial of an application to intervene of right. Insofar as Duggan conflicts with such holding, it should no longer be followed. There being a right of appeal from denial of the application to intervene of right under Rule 52.12(a) in this case, mandamus will not lie.
The alternative writ issued herein should be quashed, and the peremptory writ denied. It is so ordered.
All concur.