State v. Greathouse

DORMAN L. STEELMAN, Special Judge.

This is a direct appeal from a conviction for capital murder, Sec. 565.001, RSMo, with a sentence of life imprisonment without eligibility for parole for fifty years. This court has jurisdiction pursuant to Mo. Const, art. V, Sec. 3.

On Tuesday, September 5, 1978, citizens informed a Douglas County deputy sheriff, Jenkins, that Clayton Dawson might be missing. Dawson was a sixty-six year old man who lived in a trailer near Ava, Missouri, with his nephew whom he had raised since infancy. The nephew, Robin Scott Greathouse, 17 years old, called his uncle “dad.”…