Michelle Chapman, Clerk, Circuit Court of Missouri, Randolph County v. Jane Doe, by Next Friend Anthony E. Rothert
In December 2018, Respondent Jane Doe, an unemancipated minor, sought a judicial bypass procedure to have an abortion from a Missouri circuit court. The clerk's office, reporting to Petitioner Michelle Chapman, was initially unfamiliar with the process and asked Doe to return. After consulting with the judge, Clerk Chapman required that any petition for a bypass required that notice of the hearing be sent to Doe's parents. The questions presented are:
1. Whether Clerk Chapman was properly denied quasi-judicial immunity because the judge could not recall anything about the case, including whether he directed her to notify the parents when an unemancipated minor filed an application for a judicial bypass to have an abortion?
2. This Court has repeatedly "declined to decide whether a parental notification statute must include some sort of bypass provision to be constitutional." Lambert v. Wicklund, 520 U.S. 292, 295 (1997) (per curiam). In light of this Court's announcements, was it clearly established in 2018 that providing pre-hearing notification to an unemancipated minor's parent of a judicial bypass procedure violates the minor's clearly established rights?
3. Whether in light of this Court's intervening decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Org., 142 S. Ct. 2228, 2284 (2022), the Court should remand to determine whether Doe can show she has a right to a judicial bypass procedure without notice to her parents?
Whether Clerk Chapman was properly denied quasi-judicial immunity