Missouri Laws 521.500 – Controversies between plaintiffs, how and where adjudicated
1. Where the same property is attached in several actions by different plaintiffs, against the same defendant, the court may settle and determine all controversies which may arise between any of the plaintiffs in relation to the property, and the priority, validity, good faith, force and effect of the different attachments, and may dissolve any attachment, partially or wholly, or postpone it to another, or make such order in the premises as right and justice may require.
2. If the writs issued from different courts of coordinate jurisdiction, such controversies shall be determined by that court out of which the first writ of attachment was issued; in order whereto, the cases originating in the other court shall be transferred to it, and shall thenceforth be there heard, tried and determined in all their parts, as if they had been instituted therein.
Terms Used In Missouri Laws 521.500
- Attachment: A procedure by which a person's property is seized to pay judgments levied by the court.
- Defendant: In a civil suit, the person complained against; in a criminal case, the person accused of the crime.
- Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
- Plaintiff: The person who files the complaint in a civil lawsuit.
- Property: includes real and personal property. See Missouri Laws 1.020
- Writ: A formal written command, issued from the court, requiring the performance of a specific act.
3. And when the defendant has been notified by publication, and does not appear, any plaintiff, in the circumstances contemplated in this section, may make any defense to any previous attachment, or to the action, which the defendant might; but no judgment on any issue made in such manner shall be binding on the defendant personally, or bar the plaintiff in an action so contested by an opposing plaintiff from again suing the defendant on the same cause of action.