Robert

I believe you are probably right.  I have researched my own question a little more thoroughly...and discovered the following.  Jay, you may find it quite interesting.

Under Old Title Insurance Law in Missouri Statute 381.412 it states in summary that "settlement agent" (anyone holding a document as fiduciary for an entity, be he buyer, seller, or lender) shall record such security instruments within three days; and a violation thereof may entail assessing fines of not more than two thousand dollars.  My very reliable source has informed me that within the past few year,  the Missouri Statutes were revised and that currently the Secretary of State discloses the revision but if researched will find that those revisions were indeed declared unconstitutional and reverted back to the Old Title Insurance Law regarding recordation and responsibility of settlement agents. It has also been stated that the Division of Insurance will interpret the statute as broadly as they are able to.  Hence, I think some boxes sitting in title insurance companies offices in the St Louis area better be emptied.  Personally, I think it is quite irresponsible business practice to be so casual and nonchalant.  It is not only illegal, it is unethical.  Shame on them.

And Jay....for nearly ten years now I have been told that St Louis County indexes were going online.  In retrospect, with all the Privacy issues surrounding the industry - it will probably prove to their benefit that they have been so slow.  I don't know if you noticed, but on the County tax website they offer homeowners an option to fill out a form that is good for one year.  The form will remove the homeowners name from the website so it cannot be searched under "Name".  I wonder if they will do the same with the purchasable CDs for Name to Locator.  I worked with (with some hesitation on their behalf) at updating our microfiche database a few years ago - the data from 2000 forward was so "dirty" our IT guy had, and is still having issues cleaning it up. Updates to that info is slow in obtaining....I think the volume of data in St Louis County is the issue.

Anyway....thank you all so much for the input...

Ellen