Court Opinion

ID: 9634646
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 13:19:06.920526+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:43:02.055367
License: Public Domain

WOLFF, Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I concur in the separate opinion of Judge White, and write separately to emphasize what I believe are basic due process principles applicable to this case.
The principal opinion holds that Danny James, the stabbing victim, is bound by the finding of intent on the guilty plea in the state’s criminal case against Paul, the man who stabbed him. It is a matter of fundamental due process that one is not bound by a judgment to which he was not a party or adequately represented by a party. See Hansberry v. Lee, 311 U.S. 32, 40-41, 61 S.Ct. 115, 85 L.Ed. 22 (1940); Jack H. Friedenthal, Mary Kay Kane & Arthur R. Miller, Civil Procedure § 14.13 (3d ed.1999).
Danny James, the stabbing victim, was not a party to the state’s case against Paul. The only theory that would conform the majority opinion to due process is that the victim’s interests were represented by his assailant in the criminal case.
If that seems strange, it is. Only an excessively flexible notion of “privity” would sound like an explanation — that James is bound because he is claiming through the coverage that State Farm provides to Paul. The majority opinion relies on the Restatement (Second) of Judgments, section 85(b)(2), to establish privity between James and Paul; however, the position taken by the principal opinion is specifically rejected in comment f of that section. Illustration No. 10 in comment f of the Restatement (Second) of Judg*694ments, section 85, is virtually the same as this case:
D inflicts a blow on X as a result of which X dies. D is convicted of intentional homicide. P, administrator of X’s estate, brings an action against D for wrongful death, alleging D’s act was negligent. I had previously issued a policy of liability insurance to D, insuring liability for D’s negligent acts but excluding intentional acts. In P’s action against D, P is not precluded by the criminal conviction from showing that D’s act was negligent rather than intentional.
The appendices to the Restatement (Second) of Judgments cite numerous cases, some that agree and some that disagree with this position. But as far as I can determine, the Restatement has not changed its position on this point, and the Restatement position more closely conforms to due process norms than the cases that reject the Restatement position.
On due process, the United States Supreme Court in Hansberry v. Lee, 311 U.S. 32, 40-41, 61 S.Ct. 115, 85 L.Ed. 22 (1940), is particularly instructive. Whether one is represented by another in a previous adjudication depends on whether their interests are the same or in conflict. Id. at 43, 61 S.Ct. 115; see also American Polled Hereford v. City of Kansas City, 626 S.W.2d 237, 241 (Mo.1982). Paul, in the criminal case, was representing only his own interests. His goal was to emerge from the criminal case with the minimum of consequences. Needless to say, Paul was not protecting James’ interests when Paul stabbed James. It is likewise hard to fathom that Paul was representing James’ interests when Paul pled guilty to stabbing James. In the civil negligence action, Paul and James may both have been interested in proving the factual element of negligence, but “privity is not established simply because the parties are interested in the same question or in proving or disproving the same state of facts.” Clements v. Pittman, 765 S.W.2d 589, 591 (Mo. banc 1989).
In the plea proceeding, it cannot be said that James’ interests were adequately represented by Paul for James to have had his day in court.
In short, I would remand this case to the circuit court for a hearing in which both James and the insurance company have their day in court. The issue is whether Paul’s injury to James was inflicted intentionally, as the insurance company contends, or whether it was other than intentional, which would invoke the coverage of the insurance policy.