Opinion ID: 1874397
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Defining supplemental petition

Text: The principal opinion notes that the term supplemental petition is not expressly defined in Missouri law. However, section 509.510, entitled Supplemental Pleadings, provides in part that: Upon motion of a party the court may, upon reasonable notice and upon such terms as are just, permit him to serve a supplemental pleading setting forth transactions or occurrences or events which have happened since the date of the pleading sought to supplemented. A petition is a pleading. Therefore, a supplemental petition is a supplemental pleading within the plain meaning of section 509.510. Analyzed in light of section 509.510, a petition to terminate parental rights is not merely a supplemental pleading or petition. Unlike a supplemental petition, a petition to terminate parental rights is not filed upon the motion of a party. It is filed either on the state's own initiative or, in some instances, by statutory mandate. See, e.g., section 211.447.2. Unlike a supplemental petition, a petition to terminate parental rights does not simply set forth transactions and occurrences that have happened since the date of a protective custody petition. Instead, as the Brault court held, it is an independent civil action seeking a fundamentally different result supported by a different set of required factual findings. A supplemental petition is nothing more than a mechanism to add a necessary party or clarify an allegation. [1] Thus, the supplemental petition referenced in Rule 126.01(c) refers only to a supplemental juvenile division petition seeking, for example, a change in an order of disposition entered by the juvenile division. The statutorily mandated procedures for commencing an action to terminate parental rights further support the conclusion that such actions are independent. Section 211.452 requires the petition to terminate parental rights to be filed in the juvenile division that has prior jurisdiction over the child. Section 211.453 provides that service of the summons on the petition shall be made as in other civil cases in the manner prescribed in section 506.150, RSMo. Chapter 506 governs the Commencement of Actions, with section 506.150 specifically setting forth the manner in which service of process must be made in civil cases. If petitions to terminate parental rights were nothing more than a supplemental petition, there would be no need to serve process in compliance with section 506.150 governing the commencement of civil actions. In lieu of the aforementioned statutes, the principal opinion relies upon the fact that petitions to terminate parental rights are sometimes given the same case number as the initial petition requesting the juvenile court to take jurisdiction. The administrative expediency of assigning case numbers is irrelevant. [2] The relevant factorsthe aforementioned statutes, the fundamental nature of the rights and interests involved in these cases, the different purposes and required findings and the actual impacts on familieslead to the conclusion that petitions to terminate parental rights are independent civil actions.