Court Opinion

ID: 9664808
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 00:30:32.871552+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:10.492226
License: Public Domain

ROBERTSON, Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I concur in the holding of the principal opinion that respondent’s use of video equipment must be prohibited in cases in which a defendant pleads guilty. The language of Section 546.030, RSMo 1986, that a person may not be permitted to plead guilty unless “he be personally present” is not ambiguous. It is not subject to this Court’s interpretative touch. Metro Auto Auction v. Director of Revenue, 707 S.W.2d 397, 401 (Mo. banc 1986). I would make the preliminary writ absolute in State ex rel. Turner v. Kinder, No. 69544.
The statutory language relating to preliminary hearings requires that the associate circuit judge “before whom any such person shall be brought shall ... examine the complainant and the witnesses produced ... in the presence of the prisoner...” *658Section 544.270, RSMo 1986. The statutory command here is ambiguous. Presence is defined as “1. Act, fact, or state of being present, or of being in a certain place and not elsewhere, or of being within sight or call, at hand, or in some place that is being thought of; a being in company, attendance or association.” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, (1966). In my view, the attributes of being present are themselves present through the use of the audio/video equipment contemplated by respondent.
It would serve little purpose for me to indulge in a further explication of my position regarding hearings. Judge Welliver adequately expresses my position on the subject. I concur in that portion of his separate opinion which discusses preliminary hearings and would quash the preliminary writ issued in State ex rel. Jackson v. Kinder, No. 69546.
Likewise, I share Judge Blackmar’s views regarding arraignments and pleas of not guilty. There being no clear statutory mandate requiring personal presence, I would quash the preliminary writ issued in State ex rel. Arnold v. Kinder, No. 69545.
I concur in part and dissent in part.