Parnes v. Centertainment, Inc.

• Decision Date: 18 January 2000
• Citation: 14 S.W.3d 145
• Parties: (Mo.App. W.D. 2000) . Arnold and Estell Parnes, Appellants, v. Centertainment, Inc., Respondent. WD57126 Missouri Court of Appeals Western District Handdown Date: 0
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

14 S.W.3d 145 (Mo.App. W.D. 2000)

This slip opinion is subject to revision and may not reflect the final opinion adopted by the Court.

Arnold and Estell Parnes, Appellants, v. Centertainment, Inc., Respondent.

WD57126

Missouri Court of Appeals Western District

Handdown Date: 01/18/2000

Appeal From: Circuit Court of Jackson County, Hon. David W. Shinn

Counsel for Appellant: Stanley Wiles

Counsel for Respondent: William C. Odle

Opinion Summary:

Arnold and Estell Parnes appeal the circuit court's judgment dismissing their petition for damages against Centertainment, Inc., for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. In response to the Parneses' appeal, Centertainment filed a motion to dismiss the appeal on the ground that the Parneses did not obey rules of appellate procedure

DISMISSED.

Division holds: The Parneses did not file a certified copy of the petition for damages with this court in their record on appeal as required by Rule 81.15(a). Without the petition, we cannot determine whether the circuit court erred in dismissing the petition for failure to state a claim. Moreover, the Parneses' amended brief on appeal did not contain a jurisdictional statement or a sufficient statement of facts as required by Rule 84.04. Violations of the rules of appellate procedure are grounds for dismissal of an appeal.

Opinion Author: PER CURIAM

Opinion Vote: DISMISSED. Spinden, P.J., Lowenstein and Ulrich, JJ., concur.

Opinion:

Arnold and Estell Parnes appeal the circuit court's judgment dismissing their petition for damages against Centertainment, Inc., for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. In response to the Parneses' appeal, Centertainment filed a motion to dismiss the appeal on the ground that the Parneses did not obey rules of appellate procedure. Because we find numerous violations, we sustain the motion and dismiss the appeal.

The Parneses did not file a certified copy of the petition for damages with this court in their record on appeal.¹ Rule 81.15(a) says, "Except as provided in Rule 81.15(c), the legal file shall be certified by the clerk of the trial court to consist of true copies of portions of the trial record, proceedings, and evidence previously reduced to writing and filed in the trial court." Without the petition, we cannot determine whether the circuit court erred in dismissing the petition for failure to state a claim. Although the Parneses filed motions with this court to file a supplemental legal file and a second supplemental legal file containing a copy of the petition, we denied the motions because the supplemental legal files were not certified or stipulated to by the parties.² After the denials of their motions, the Parneses did not attempt to file a certified copy of the petition or file a stipulation by the parties as to the accuracy of the uncertified copy of the petition.

Moreover, the Parneses' amended brief on appeal did not contain a jurisdictional statement or a sufficient statement of facts as required by Rule 84.04. The Parneses filed a motion with this court asking it to allow them to file supplemental pages to its brief because they inadvertently did not include "pages 1 and 1A . . . which includes the Jurisdictional Statement and Statement of Facts[.]" This court granted the Parneses' motion, but the Parneses did not file "pages 1 and 1A" to be included with their amended brief. We struck the Parneses' first brief because the argument portion did not include "a concise statement of the applicable standard of review for each claim of error, in violation of Rule 84.04(e)." The first brief did contain a jurisdictional statement and a statement of facts. When we struck the first brief, however, we informed the Parneses:

[T]he Court will no longer permit appellants to amend their briefs by reprinting only the defective portions. The Court has [struck] the entire brief and will require that the entire brief be reprinted or reduplicated. If you want to use portions of the original brief, you may pick them up in the Clerk's office or . . . make arrangements to have them mailed to you.

The Parneses were obligated to file the supplemental pages for their amended brief with this court, and it was not this court's obligation to supplement the Parneses' brief with pages from a brief which had been struck.

Even if ...