FIRST REGULAR SESSION
93RD GENERAL ASSEMBLY
INTRODUCED BY REPRESENTATIVES BYRD (Sponsor), BURNETT, PRATT, STEVENSON, JOHNSON (61), YATES, JOHNSON (90), GOODMAN, WITTE, VOGT, BRINGER, FLOOK AND LIPKE (Co-sponsors).
Read 1st time March 2, 2005 and copies ordered printed.
STEPHEN S. DAVIS, Chief Clerk
AN ACT
To repeal section 510.120, RSMo, and to enact in lieu thereof one new section relating to judicial procedures.
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the state of Missouri, as follows:
Section A. Section 510.120, RSMo, is repealed and one new section enacted in lieu thereof, to be known as section 510.120, to read as follows:
510.120. 1. During the period beginning December fifteenth of each year and ending June fifteenth of the following year there shall be a stay of all administrative and court proceedings in which any member of the general assembly is an attorney for any party, a necessary witness, or a party to a civil action. Such stay shall not be discretionary with any trial court and shall be invoked by the filing of a notice by a member of the general assembly filing with the clerk of the court stating that he or she is a member of the general assembly. Such stay shall apply to all trials, motions, hearings, discovery responses, depositions, responses to motions, docket calls, and any other proceedings before any court in this state, including municipal courts and probate courts and all administrative bodies. Such stay shall also apply to any order requiring any member of the general assembly to serve as a juror during the aforesaid time period. Such stay shall not relieve any party of any obligations under either a statute of limitations or the performance of an obligation based upon a final judgment. Such stay shall not apply to any circuit court proceeding in which a member of the general assembly is the criminal defendant.
2. In all civil cases or administrative proceedings or in criminal cases pending in this state at any time when the general assembly is in [regular session,] veto session, special session, or holding out-of-session committee hearings, it shall be a sufficient cause for [a] such continuance if it shall appear to the court, by [affidavit] written notice, that any party applying for such continuance, or any attorney, solicitor or counsel of such party is a member of either house of the general assembly, and in actual attendance on the out-of-session committee hearings, [regular session,] special session, or veto session of the same, and that the attendance of such party, attorney, solicitor or counsel is necessary to a fair and proper trial or other proceeding in such suit; and on the filing of such [affidavit] notice the court shall continue such suit and any and all motions or other proceedings therein, of every kind and nature, including the taking of depositions and discovery responses, and thereupon no trial or other proceedings of any kind or nature shall be had therein until the adjournment or recess for [twenty] three days or more of the [regular session,] special session[,] or veto session of the general assembly, nor for [ten days] one day before or after or the day of any out-of-session committee hearings. Such [affidavit] notice shall be sufficient, if made [at any time during] within twenty days of the out-of-session committee hearings, [regular session,] special session, or veto session of the general assembly, showing that at the time of making the same such party, attorney, solicitor or counsel is scheduled to be in actual attendance upon such out-of-session committee hearings, [regular session,] special session, or veto session of the general assembly.