The Missouri Supreme Court
The case for impeachment.

This time they crossed the line

Two hundred and forty year ago our forefathers stood up to the King of England and formed a democracy, a government that existed for the sole purpose of serving the people. The government was divided up into 4 branches, the executive, the legislature, the judiciary, and the people. The judicial branch of government exists for the single purpose of providing for justice and nothing else. When judiciary fails to perform its duty as required by the constitution it is the duty of the executive and the legislature, and ultimately the people to rise up and take control and to restore the judiciary to a position that is subservient to the people through the powers of impeachment. The impeachment of the entire high court should not be taken lightly, however, there comes a point where the people's need for just and honest courts demands that strong positions be taken to ensure the integrity of the judiciary. We have now arrived at that point.

1. I have discovered that the judges of the Missouri Supreme Court are not signing their orders and that thousands of orders and judgements that are unsigned by a judge in the Missouri Supreme Court are void.

2. The judges of the Missouri Supreme Court have allowed and required non-judges to exercise judicial authority and make orders and judgements of the court. The judges have, in affect, appointed non-judges to have the powers of judges. This is a usurpation of power because the judges in Missouri are either elected by the people or appointed by the Governor.

3. The chief justice of the Missouri Supreme Court signed a judgement retroactively in a case that was, according to the minutes of the December 21st 1999 meeting, never before the court. When a judge falsifies a judgement that was never heard by the court he should be removed from office.

4. The Missouri Supreme Court, in their administrative capacity, and allow the Missouri Court of Appeals, Southern District Judges to continue to refuse to sign order of the court when asked to. The Missouri Supreme Court is charged with the administration and superintending control of the lower courts, yet refuses to require the judges of the lower courts to sign orders and judgements as required by law.

5. The Missouri Supreme Court has, without due process of law denied citizens the right to petition the court and for the citizen to have his case heard and decided by the court. Instead, the court has delegated judicial authority to research attorneys and clerks to decide and has concealed its activities by fraudulently signing decisions made by the courts staff.

6. The Missouri Supreme Court has caused its clerks to break Administrative Rule 4.09(6) by requiring clerks to file orders and judgements of the court without the required signature of a judge.

7. The Missouri Supreme Court has caused its research attorneys to exercise judicial powers by requiring them to decide motions, and cases and to issue orders and decisions in behalf of the judges.

8. The Missouri Supreme Court refused to make a ruling when presented with the important issue of deciding whether or not an order of the court was valid without a judges signature. The reason they refused to rule on this issue was for the purpose of concealing the fact that they themselves are not in compliance with the rules themselves. Had the court ruled according to the Constitution, the decision would have rendered void thousands of cases they decided and that were decided in the court of appeals.

9. The fact that the Missouri Supreme Court went to the trouble to attempt to phony up a judgement signed by a judge is an admission through conduct that they know that they are required to sign orders of the court. However, knowing this, they knowingly and deliberately, by use of fraud and forgery, attempted to conceal their misconduct through denial of due process of law.

10. That through their conduct, the Missouri Supreme Court has brought shame and embarrassment upon this state, and upon the integrity of the court itself, and has caused the public to lose confidence in the court itself so as to undermine the institution of justice for the people.

11. The Missouri Supreme Court's blatant disregard for their own rules sets an example of general lawlessness within the judicial community. It sends a message that the judges of Missouri are above the law and can violate the law and their own rules with impunity. If the high court has not respect for its own rules then why should the People have any respect for them either?

12. The people of the state of Missouri have a right to know with certainty that the judgements and orders of the court are actually decided by a judge and only a judge. The people have a right to require that the judiciary follow their own rules of court and to maintain the ethical standards for lawyers and judges outlined in the Missouri Rules of Court.

13. Missouri judgements are invalid in every other state and federal court because they are unsigned. Any litigant can challenge the full faith and credit clause of the Constitution as applied to Missouri judgements by demanding that a signed copy be produced, and on the basis of due process of law.

14. Article VII section 1 of the Missouri Constitution makes the judges of the Missouri Supreme Court liable for impeachment for misconduct, willful neglect of duty, corruption in office, and incompetency which accurately describes the conduct of the Missouri Supreme Court.

15. Article VII section 2 of the Missouri Constitution gives the Missouri State House of Representatives the power to bring an impeachment against the offending judges.

WHEREFORE, I Marc Perkel, call on the members of the Missouri House of Representatives to bring articles of impeachment against the justices of the Supreme Court of Missouri.

Summary of the events leading up to this

Well, as many of you know I have this ongoing battle with the Missouri Courts over the issues of orders of the court not being signed by judges. It started with an order I discovered in my divorce file what was a hand written order that wasn't signed by anybody. My point is that if an order isn't signed and we don't know who wrote it, the order is void. I brought it to court and it got dismissed. I was even penalized with attorney's fees for even raising the issue. I appealed.

In the Court of Appeals, Southern District here in Springfield Mo. I started getting decisions from the appeals court signed by the clerk of the court rather than the judge. I went down to the court and asked to see the original order signed by the judge and I was informed that the judges do not sign the orders there. I filed a motion to have the order declared void and get an order, signed by a judge. My motion was denied, and the denial order was signed by the clerk. For those of you who are wondering what the rule in this is:

Administrative Rule 4.09(6) ... "Orders or judgements entered on the docket sheet(s) by the judge or the clerk shall be signed by the judge or supported by a memorandum in the file signed by the judge."

Rule 74.01(a) "A judgement is rendered when entered. A judgement is entered when a writing signed by the judge and denominated "judgement" is filed."

Me: Do you actually see the judge give the order?

Clerk: Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.

Me: How do I know that your research attorneys aren't making these orders in behalf of the judges?

Clerk: I guess that's an open question, uh huh.

My decision came back DENIED, and the "judgement" was signed by the CLERK, Thomas Simon and Norma Jean Creach D.C. I called the court and asked for a copy of the decision signed by a judge. They said they would have to get back to me on that. I then faxed them a letter making a formal request for an order signed by the judge.

The decision is certified that it was decided on December 21st 1999 and is a full and complete transcript of the judgement of the Supreme Court. However, I went to the Supreme Court's web site and it have a link to a transcript of the "minutes" of the December 21st meeting, and guess what - my case is not listed. According to the minutes, it was never heard by the court. Apparently, someone other than a judge made the decision to deny my writ. Had my case been decided by a judge it would have been listed with all the other writs that were decided.

On December 27th 1999 I got a fax from Bill L. Thompson of the Missouri Supreme Court. He sent me a docket sheet that had a hand written order on it. The order was dated December 21st and it was initialed by William Ray Price, Chief Justice of the Missouri Supreme Court.

Later that day I had a friend visit the Supreme Court and look into the files of several other writs that were decided the same day as mine. My case was the only case he saw that had a hand written decision on the docket. All the other cases were signed by the clerk of the court.

What does this mean?

Clearly the notification I got from the clerk of the court is a false document. We don't know who made this order, except that it wasn't a justice. If the justices had heard my case on December 21st it would have been in the minutes. The fact that it isn't in the minutes clearly indicates it was not heard. Someone in the court is forging decisions of the court. I would point out that the reason the Rules of Court say that judgements shall be signed by a judge is to prevent this sort of thing from happening.

Let me just spell it out what I think is happening here. The justices of the court are out playing golf or getting high while the research attorneys do all the work. They make the decisions and have the clerk sign them without the judges even being aware they exist. To be consistent, none of the decisions of the Missouri Supreme Court are signed. I'll bet that there are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of orders and judgements that were never signed by a judge, and no one really knows if they were decided by a judge. If this were properly investigated, I think you would find that most of these decisions were decided by the staff without any form of judicial review at all.

Additionally, if this is so, everything the Missouri Supreme Court has done is void. The case law is clear on this issue that orders not signed by a judge are void. That means that it's a do over for possibly thousands of cases. I'm not sure what process it would take to fix these decisions but it isn't going to be pretty.

Message to Missouri State Employees: It has come to my attention that a work stoppage might be in violation of the law. If it is, then, if you feel you want to support my cause, you should take that into account and consider some other means to get the message across to the Missouri Supreme Court that they can't break the law. I believe in this case there is constitutional justification to take any action necessary to prevent the high court from undermining the law. If citizens didn't stand up to the government, we'd still be fighting the Vietnam war. The People are the Fourth Branch of Governmemt and the people have a responsibility to defend democracy when it is threatened by the high court.