Wahl v. Braun

• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals
• Writing for the Court: CRANE
• Citation: Wahl v. Braun, 938 S.W.2d 591 (Mo. App. 1996)
• Decision Date: 24 December 1996
• Docket Number: No. 69415,69415
• Parties: Thomas L. WAHL, Plaintiff/Appellant, v. Timothy A. BRAUN, Defendant/Respondent.

Page 591

938 S.W.2d 591

Thomas L. WAHL, Plaintiff/Appellant, v. Timothy A. BRAUN, Defendant/Respondent.

No. 69415.

Missouri Court of Appeals,

Eastern District,

Division Two.

Dec. 24, 1996.

Motion for Rehearing and/or Transfer to

Supreme Court Denied Feb. 19, 1997.

Thomas L. Wahl, Saint Louis, pro se.

John C. Maxwell, St. Charles, for defendant/respondent.

CRANE, Presiding Judge.

Plaintiff appeals the dismissal of his defamation action. In his third amended petition, plaintiff, Thomas L. Wahl, a St. Charles County resident, alleged that Timothy A. Braun, the St. Charles prosecutor, defamed him in remarks made to a newspaper reporter about the hundred letters plaintiff had written to the prosecutor and a lawsuit plaintiff had filed against the prosecutor. The prosecutor said the letters asked him to adopt "lax standards on pornography" and also remarked, "Wahl's suit will not intimidate me. I am going to enforce the law no matter who sues me." Plaintiff claimed the statements imputed him with the crime of hindering prosecution as set out in § 575.030 RSMo 1994. The trial court dismissed the petition on the grounds that the statements did not, as a matter of law, impute plaintiff with the crime of hindering prosecution. On appeal plaintiff claims that the dismissal violated Article I, § 8 of the state constitution and that the allegedly defamatory words spoken by the prosecutor indirectly imputed plaintiff with the commission of a crime. We affirm.

For his first two points plaintiff asserts that the dismissal violated Article I, § 8 of the Missouri Constitution. He contends that this section gives a libel plaintiff the right to present evidence and have the jury determine the law and the facts and that a court cannot preclude a plaintiff from exercising those rights by dismissing the case. We disagree.

Article I, § 8 of the Missouri Constitution provides:

That no law shall be passed impairing the freedom of speech, no matter by what means communicated: that every person shall be free to say, write or publish, or otherwise communicate whatever he will on any subject, being responsible for all abuses of that liberty; and that in all suits and prosecutions for libel or slander the truth thereof may be given in evidence; and in suits and prosecutions for libel the jury, under the direction of the court, shall determine the law and the facts.

This constitutional provision stems from Fox's Libel Act adopted by the English Parliament in 1792 to correct a practice which had developed in the trial of English criminal libel prosecutions in which the judge, and not the jury, determined that the matter complained of was a libel. Jacobs v. Transcontinental & Western Air, 358 Mo. 674, 216 S.W.2d 523, 527 (1948). Fox's Libel Act allowed the whole case to be decided by the jury as any other criminal case. Id. The purpose of the Missouri constitutional provision was, like the Fox Libel Act in England, to do away with the common law practice under which the jury only decided guilt. Henry v. Halliburton, 690 S.W.2d 775, 779 n. 7 (Mo. banc 1985). The constitutional provision allows juries to acquit persons expressing critical or unpopular views. Id. This provision was intended for the benefit of defendants and has been interpreted to mean a court may not direct a verdict for a plaintiff in a libel case. Dominick v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 741 S.W.2d 290, 293 n. 1 (Mo.App.1987); Lupkey v. Weldon, 419 S.W.2d 91, 93 (Mo. banc 1967).

However, this constitutional provision "does not in any way affect the power of the court to decide as a matter of law that the statement claimed to be libelous is not capable of a defamatory meaning." Jacobs, 216 S.W.2d at 527. Courts in the first instance must determine whether a statement is capable of defamatory meaning; if it is so capable, then it is submitted to the jury to determine if the words were so understood. Henry, 690 S.W.2d at 779. Article I, § 8 does not prevent the trial court from dismissing plaintiff's defamation action for failure to state a claim. Coots v. Payton, 365 Mo. 180, 280 S.W.2d 47, 51 (1955); Swafford v. Miller, 711 S.W.2d 211, 213 (Mo.App.1986). Points one and two are denied.

For his third point plaintiff asserts the trial court erred in ruling that the statements were not defamatory. Plaintiff asserts the prosecutor's statements constituted an indirect imputation of the crime of hindering prosecution as set out in § 575.030 RSMo 1994. Plaintiff argues that the prosecutor's statement, "Wahl's suit will not intimidate me. I am going to enforce the law no matter who sues me," imputes to plaintiff the commission of the offense of hindering prosecution by suggesting to the public that plaintiff was attempting to intimidate a law enforcement officer and that plaintiff filed his lawsuit to prevent the...