Court Opinion

ID: 9754938
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:19:04.463236+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:00.941420
License: Public Domain

STEPHEN N. LIMBAUGH, JR., Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
This case stands for the dubious and heretofore unheard of proposition that a person affected by the order of a former governor can successfully petition the courts to change the legal effect of that order on the ground that the governor now proclaims that he meant something different than what he said. I am afraid to speculate what other kinds of orders and pronouncements of a governor who has left *438office might also be subject to this precedent.
By their own limited terms, each of the orders in these cases provided only that, “This commutation eliminates from the sentence the prohibition against eligibility for parole for 50 years and makes [Lute and Branch] eligible for parole consideration.” There is no ambiguity, patent or latent, the governor’s intent is clear from the words he used, and there is simply no room for a contrary interpretation in logic or law. See Six Flags Theme Parks, Inc. v. Dir. of Revenue, 179 S.W.3d 266, 268 (Mo. banc 2005) and Brownstein v. Rhomberg-Haglin & Assoc., Inc., 824 S.W.2d 13, 15 (Mo. banc 1992) (both holding where language is clear, unambiguous, and admits of only one meaning, there is no room for interpretation). This order does nothing more than make these women eligible for parole when they had been otherwise ineligible. Had the governor intended for these women to be released, he could have commuted the sentences to time served, but he did not do so. Instead, actual relief for these women was dependent upon subsequent, discretionary action by the Missouri Board of Probation and Parole.1
Faced with the parole board’s decision that release of these women would “depreciate the seriousness of the offense[s],” and with the tacit acknowledgment that the governor’s order provided only that the women were merely eligible for parole, the majority attempts to cure the problem by stating: “While the commutations might not have explicitly stated that the Governor had considered ‘the seriousness of the present offense,’ that is necessarily implied because otherwise the Governor would not have recommended these two women for parole after considering the facts of their cases.” The follow-up to this implication, as I understand it, is that the parole board is thus precluded from denying parole on the ground that it would depreciate the seriousness of the offense, because to deny parole on that ground is to “ignore the Governor’s expressed intent [as set out in his affidavits] in derogation of the Gover*439nor’s constitutional authority to exercise grace ...”
But, even if the governor necessarily factored in the degree to which his decision would depreciate the seriousness of the offenses, it does not follow that the parole board should be foreclosed from denying parole for that reason. The majority’s position proceeds on the false premise that the power and operation of the parole board in granting and denying parole is somehow informed or dependent upon the governor’s intent that the board can rely on certain considerations but not others. In fact, however, the governor’s clemency powers are limited to reprieves, commutations and pardons, Mo. Const, art. IV, sec. 7, and the governor has no authority to dictate whether or under what circumstances the parole board may exercise its independent statutory functions. Indeed, Article IV, sec. 7, expressly delinks the respective functions of the governor and parole board by providing that, “The power to pardon shall not include the power to parole.” In addition, section 217.690, RSMo Supp.2006, delineates the separate function of the parole board by providing that, “When in its opinion there is a reasonable probability that an offender in a correctional center can be released without detriment to the community or to himself, the board may in its discretion release on parole such person except as otherwise prohibited by law.” (Emphasis added). The parole function, then, is solely within the province of the parole board, and parole decisions are matters solely for the board’s discretion.
In sum, these women are now eligible for parole, but they are not entitled to it. The parole decision should be left to the discretion of the parole board, and the seriousness of the offenses should still be a factor that may be considered. In deference to the parole board, and to the law, I would deny relief.

. Despite the horrific allegations of spousal abuse that the majority takes from the petitions, there is no record of the proceedings before the parole board and no record whether proof of these allegations was in any event submitted to the board.
Like my colleagues, I, too, am sympathetic with the plight of these two women, but the allegations as stated in the majority opinion present their cases as if there were a gross miscarriage of justice in the circumstances of their convictions and appeals. Lute was convicted of murder for hire, and she never contested the sufficiency of the evidence in her appeals, nor did she raise any issue about her inability to introduce evidence of spousal abuse. State v. Lute, 608 S.W.2d 381 (Mo.1980); State v. Lute, 641 S.W.2d 80 (Mo.1982). At trial, her defense was that she had no involvement whatsoever in the murder, so any evidence of spousal abuse, whether pursuant to a “battered spouse syndrome” defense or otherwise, was irrelevant. See id.
Branch, on the other hand, first claimed that the murder of her husband was committed by an intruder but later changed her story to claim that she and her husband had been arguing, that he had come at her with a gun, and that the gun had accidentally discharged. State v. Branch, 757 S.W.2d 595 (Mo.App.1988). According to the transcript of the second trial, Branch was allowed to present extensive evidence of spousal abuse, including evidence of severe and repeated beatings, not only through her own testimony but through three independent witnesses, as well. She also called an expert witness who testified that she suffered from "battered spouse syndrome.” The judge and jury took all of this testimony into consideration. Although the majority states that, "For unexplained reasons, [Branch's] lawyers in the second trial again did not introduce all of the evidence of the abuse,” the record shows that the judge who heard her claims for post-conviction relief found that several of the witnesses were unable to be located after a diligent search by trial counsel’s investigator and that such evidence they would have offered was nevertheless cumulative.