James L. Gant Missouri Cases

James L. Gant was convicted of six felonies, including unlawful use of a weapon, assault, and armed criminal action. On appeal, Gant argued that the circuit court abused its discretion by allowing a witness's in-court identification, which he claimed was unreliable due to impermissibly suggestive circumstances created by law enforcement housing him and the witness in the same jail pod. The appellate court affirmed the judgment, holding that Gant's objection was preserved but that the inadvertent jail encounter did not constitute an impermissibly suggestive identification procedure by the State, thus not triggering due process concerns for exclusion.