Jackson County Missouri Civil Court Cases

Supreme Court to hear case about Mo. DWI law

An unprecedented case in Missouri is perhaps one more good reason to not drink and drive this holiday weekend.

Recent changes in Missouri law is affecting what is happening on DWI stops. It's all about the implied consent law. If you have a Missouri driver's license then you automatically agree to take a blood alcohol test while under arrest for DWI. You can refuse, but it may be more trouble than it's worth.

Trooper Blaine Adams with the Missouri Highway Patrol says changes in the law are making his job easier.

"It's excellent," said Adams. 

Lawmakers eliminated four words from the implied consent law. "None shall be given," saying if a person under arrest for DWI refuses a blood alcohol test then (under the previous statute) no test would be given.

"The only way a police officer could obtain a chemical test if you refused would be to call a prosecutor and obtain a search warrant," said John N. Koester Jr., Cape Girardeau County Assistant Prosecuting Attorney. 

The law implies driving on the roads is a privilege, not a right.

"It's implied you're giving consent for a blood, breath or urine test so a police officer can obtain your level of intoxication," said Koester. 

If a person refuses a breath test, troopers like Blaine Adams will drive them straight to a local hospital for a blood test.

"Before we would have to contact a prosecutor and fill out paperwork, wake up a judge, and get a search warrant," said Adams. 

Last October, a Jackson man was pulled over in Cape Girardeau County under suspicion of DWI.  According to court records, when the officer made contact with the man he detected a strong odor of alcohol on his breath and his eyes were glassy and bloodshot. The man stated he had a couple of beers, and was unstable when he exited his vehicle.

The officer, according to court records, administered field sobriety tests in which the subject reportedly performed poorly. He then refused the breath test, so a blood sample was taken without his permission.

"His blood alcohol turned out to be a .154 which is nearly twice the legal limit," said Koester.

That case went to court, and the trial court ruled the case did not involve exigent circumstances saying the Fourth Amendment requires either a warrant or exigent circumstance to withdraw blood without consent.

Anatomy of a Wrongful Conviction Case - Archives

Investigative journalists helped free a Missouri man who spent 15 years in prison for a murder he didn’t commit. But can the media continue to play its watchdog role?

The battle to free someone wrongly convicted of a crime can be long and arduous. Typically, it is waged by attorneys and journalists, with a supporting cast of family members, innocence advocates and others willing to go the distance to help someone who is locked away for years or even decades.

The case of Dale Helmig of Missouri is an example.

Convicted and imprisoned for the 1993 murder of his mother, Norma, Helmig was freed last December after Dekalb County Missouri Circuit Court Judge Warren McElwain found “clear and convincing evidence” of his innocence. But Helmig might well still be in prison—if it had not been for the tenacious efforts of   investigative reporters in Missouri and elsewhere in the country.

Ironically, the kind of journalism that helped free Helmig is threatening to disappear,  as pressures mount on newsrooms around the country.

Journalists were not the only players in the 15-year battle that began with Helmig’s conviction in 1996.  A pro bono legal team which managed to enlist the help of a regional innocence project as well as Helmig’s brother Richard were also instrumental.

And Helmig's story may not be over.  Although he was released five weeks after Judge McElwain’s ruling, which also cited  “very significant new evidence directly tying”  Helmig’s father, Ted, to the crime, prosecutors appealed.  The Missouri Supreme Court this week dismissed the  appeal, but the state still has 180 days to decide whether to retry him.  As of this writing, no decision has been announced. 

Helmig’s pro-bono attorney, Sean O’Brien, credits widespread press coverage of the case, as well as new evidence, for the judge’s crucial decision in 2010 to hold a habeas corpus hearing

 “It is rare for a judge to look at habeas corpus cases,” O’Brien says. “I think that [the press] did get Judge McElwain’s attention,” he says.

After Norma Helmig’s body, tethered to a concrete block, was found in the flood-engorged Osage River, about 10 miles east of Jefferson City, MO, police immediately focused their investigation on her son Dale―although no physical evidence or eyewitness accounts linked him to the crime.

Reports of cases determined in the Supreme Court of the state of Missouri

Missouri court rules

Vernon's annotated pocket code of Missouri

The Southwestern reporter

The American and English annotated cases, containing the important cases selected from the current American, Canadian, and English reports