Missouri Court of Appeals for the Eastern District in St. Louis
ST. LOUIS — The Missouri Court of Appeals Eastern District has dismissed an appeal filed by a businessman challenging a long-running 2007 corporate control dispute and ordered $85,000 in sanctions against him and his attorney, finding the appeal frivolous and devoid of merit.
In a decision filed May 19, a three-judge panel ruled that Larry Rice’s appeal failed to comply with mandatory appellate briefing rules and attempted to relitigate issues that courts have repeatedly rejected for nearly two decades.
The court assessed $75,000 in damages against Rice and an additional $10,000 against his attorney, Lynn Rodgers, under Missouri Supreme Court Rule 84.19 governing frivolous appeals.
The case stems from a 2007 lawsuit involving control of Waltepco Holding Company and its subsidiaries, including Interfood Inc.
Rice, who purchased 49% of Waltepco’s shares in 2003, became embroiled in a dispute with majority shareholder Tepco BV.
Interfood filed suit against Rice and his associate, identified in the opinion as M.H., alleging breach of fiduciary duty and breach of contract.
During the litigation, Tepco and Waltepco intervened, and in 2007 the trial court ruled in Tepco’s favor, finding that the company’s shareholder actions removing Rice and M.H. from leadership positions were valid.
The parties later reached a settlement that the court enforced in 2009 after further disputes arose.
The appellate court noted that Rice has repeatedly challenged the 2007 judgment in both state and federal courts.
According to the opinion, Rice previously filed multiple unsuccessful appeals in Missouri courts and several federal lawsuits, many of which resulted in sanctions for what courts described as vexatious litigation.
The latest appeal arose from a 2024 declaratory judgment action Rice filed against the law firm Armstrong Teasdale LLP and attorneys Thomas Cummings and Jeffrey Schultz, who represented Interfood in the original 2007 litigation.
Rice again argued that the original judgment was void because the attorneys allegedly lacked standing to bring the case on behalf of Interfood.
The trial court dismissed the lawsuit with prejudice and denied Rice’s motions, including requests for summary judgment and relief under Rule 74.06, which allows parties to seek relief from judgments under limited circumstances.
On appeal, the Missouri Court of Appeals found extensive violations of appellate briefing rules.
The judges wrote that Rice failed to provide an adequate statement of facts, omitted proper citations to the record, failed to demonstrate preservation of issues for appeal and did not challenge the actual legal basis for the trial court’s rulings.
The court also ruled that Rice improperly attempted to relitigate whether the 2007 judgment was void rather than addressing why the lower court dismissed his case.
Judges stated that the arguments ignored prior rulings and attempted to revisit matters already decided in earlier litigation.
In discussing sanctions, the panel said Rice has filed numerous lawsuits based on the same underlying facts since 2009 and has repeatedly been unsuccessful.
The opinion referenced a prior 2020 lawsuit in which a trial court imposed a $50,000 sanction and ordered Rice not to file further litigation arising from the Franklin County case.
The appellate court concluded that Rice’s latest appeal presented “no justiciable questions” and had little prospect of success.
Judges said the continued filings demonstrated Rice’s intention to pursue further frivolous claims despite repeated rulings against him.
The opinion also criticized Rice’s attorney, finding counsel shared responsibility for pursuing the appeal despite prior court rulings and deficiencies in the appellate brief.
The court stated that attorneys have a duty to discourage groundless appeals and determined that Rodgers failed to do so in this case.
Presiding Judge Michael S. Wright authored the opinion, joined by Judges Philip M. Hess and Virginia W. Lay.
Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District, Division Two case number: ED113700
