Court Opinion

ID: 9654300
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 18:13:50.430175+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:07.787540
License: Public Domain

WELLIVER, Judge,
concurring.
I concur in the result reached by the majority. The cause is reversed and remanded for further proceedings on Count II of appellant’s cross-petition (alleging conversion) because, as the principal opinion correctly points out, a claim for conversion has long been recognized as an exception to the interspousal tort immunity doctrine in Missouri. However, I have reservations about the treatment given appellant’s Count I claim alleging fraud in the procurement of a temporary restraining order which caused plaintiff damage.
The authority cited in the opinion of the majority for affirming the dismissal of appellant’s Count I claim is not persuasive. The principal opinion states:
Appellant’s complaint under Count I is that because of an alleged lie to the court, he lost his belongings. To be actionable, fraud in the procurement of a *301judgment for divorce must have been extrinsic or collateral to matters which either were or could have been presented or adjudicated in the original proceedings. Hemphill v. Hemphill, 316 S.W.2d 582 (Mo.1958).
Hemphill involved a petition filed by the guardian of an insane woman seeking to set aside a decree of divorce on the alleged ground of fraud in its procurement, and seeking an accounting from the administra-trix of the alleged husband’s estate. It is apparent that appellant’s claim for damages for alleged fraud is quite distinct from a direct attack on the validity of a divorce. Appellant does not appeal the order of December 3, 1976, granting a decree of dissolution, but instead appeals the dismissal of the three counts of his cross-petition.
In my view, the dismissal of Count I was proper because that count fails to state a cause of action for fraud. The elements necessary to constitute actionable fraud were outlined in Latta v. Robinson Erection Co., 363 Mo. 47, 248 S.W.2d 569, 576 (banc 1952) as follows:
that a representation was made as a statement of fact, which was untrue and known to be untrue by the party making it, or else recklessly made; that it was made with intent to deceive and for the purpose of inducing the other party to act upon it; and that he did in fact rely on it and was induced thereby to act to his injury and damage.
(Emphasis supplied.) Appellant’s Count I, in contrast, alleges that appellant’s bride:
falsely represented to the Court that Respondent committed certain acts putting her in fear of him, all the time knowing that such representations were untrue, and at the same time asking the Court to rely on said representations, which the Court did, in granting a restraining order which put Respondent out of the family apartment.
(Emphasis supplied.) These allegations do not allege intent to deceive appellant, intent to induce appellant’s reliance, or appellant’s reliance on the representations — rather, it is the court that is alleged to have been induced to rely on the allegedly false statements.
The dismissal of Count I on the authority of Hemphill is unacceptable if it makes this Court appear to be avoiding the question whether interspousal tort immunity should be abrogated in Missouri. Of the three counts in appellant’s cross-petition, it is only Count I that even colorably presents the interspousal tort immunity issue.
I am convinced that this case is not the proper vehicle for reconsideration of the doctrine of interspousal tort immunity articulated in the line of cases of which Ebel v. Ferguson, 478 S.W.2d 334 (Mo. banc 1972) is a part. Respondent’s petition was stricken by the trial court and judgment of dissolution entered on appellant’s cross-petition as sanctions for respondent’s failure to comply with discovery proceedings. Respondent did not file any briefs opposing appellant’s attack on the interspousal tort immunity doctrine, either in the court of appeals or in this Court. Without the full development of issues that adversary argument allows, making a change in the law with such far-reaching implications as the abrogation of interspousal tort immunity is not appropriate. Moreover, because Count I of appellant’s cross-petition fails to state a cause of action in fraud, any attempt by this Court to address the immunity question in this case would be mere dicta.