Minneapolis DWI Lawyer F. T. Sessoms Blogs on Minnesota DWI: This Week's Featured Minnesota DWI Case

The Minnesota DWI Case Of The Week is State v. Moore (Decided May 28, 2024, Minnesota Court of Appeals, Unpublished) which stands for the proposition that a jury instruction is not improper unless it materially misstates the law.

In Moore, the Defendant was arrested for DWI and the police applied for a search warrant for the Defendant's blood or urine.  As the deputy worked to submit the warrant, Defendant asked to go to the bathroom. The deputy advised Mr. Moore to wait so he could give a urine sample. Moore became increasingly agitated, continuing to ask to use the bathroom and threatening to urinate in the back of the squad car. After appellant’s repeated threats to urinate on the floor of the squad car, the deputy allowed him to use the bathroom in the emergency room at about 3:40 a.m.

At 3:49 a.m., minutes after they returned to the squad car, the deputy received the signed warrant from the judge, and the Defendant orally refused to submit a blood sample.

The deputy then transported appellant to the law-enforcement center for the Defendant to provide a urine sample. There, the deputy offered the Defendant a bottle of water, which Moore refused. The Defendant bought a can of pop from a vending machine and drank some of it. The deputy suggested to the Defendant several times that he try to urinate, but Moore responded that he did not have to because he had urinated so recently. The Defendant went into the bathroom twice but did not provide a urine sample. The deputy deemed the Defendant to have refused to consent to a urine test at 4:49 a.m.

The Defendant was charged with DWI Refusal to submit to testing and was convicted of same by a jury. On appeal, the Defendant argued that the district court abused its discretion because the jury instructions “told the jury the State had prove[d] the refusal element” by instructing them, over counsel’s objection, that a “failure to complete the entire test is a refusal.” 

The Minnesota Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction noting:

"The state charged appellant under Minn. Stat. § 169A.20, subd. 2 (2020), which states, “It is a crime for any person to refuse to submit to a chemical test... of the person’s blood or urine as required by a search warrant.” In State v. Ferrier, this court considered whether a person could refuse to submit to a chemical test without orally stating their refusal. 792 N.W.2d 98, 101-02 (Minn. App. 2010) (concluding sufficient circumstantial evidence supported determination appellant refused to submit to a test by conduct when she had been given between six and fifteen glasses of water and made three attempts to produce urine sample over three hours), rev. denied (Minn. Mar. 15, 2011). We noted that the statute requires a volitional act; “the statute does not criminalize inability to perform the steps necessary for testing.” Id. Nevertheless, we held that “[a] driver may refuse to submit to chemical testing by words or conduct. We highlighted that “actual unwillingness to submit to testing must be proved.” Id. at 101. “Depending on the total circumstances, failure to perform the necessary steps for testing may be circumstantial evidence of refusal by conduct.” Id. at 102.

"Here, the district court instructed the jury on the fourth element of the crime as follows:

Fourth, [appellant] refused to submit to a blood and urine sample. A failure to complete the entire test is a refusal.

A refusal to submit to chemical testing includes any indication of actual unwillingness to complete the testing process as determined from the driver’s words and actions in light of the totality of the circumstances. Actual unwillingness to submit to testing must be proved."

"Appellant challenges the statement, “A failure to complete the entire test is a refusal.” However, “[i]f the instructions, when read as a whole, correctly state the law in language that can be understood by the jury, there is no reversible error.” State v. Matthews, 779 N.W.2d 543, 549 (Minn. 2010) (emphasis added) (quotation omitted). When the jury instruction for the fourth element is read “as a whole,” the jury had to determine whether the state had proved “[a]ctual unwillingness to submit to testing.” Because the jury instructions “as a whole” accurately stated the law, the district court did not abuse its discretion."

Moral Of The Story: Mostly right is good enough.

If you or a loved one have been charged with a Minnesota DWI, feel free to contact Minneapolis DWI Lawyer, F. T. Sessoms at (612) 344-1505 for answers to all of your Minnesota DWI and DUI questions.

Minnesota DWI Lawyer F. T. Sessoms Blogs on Minnesota DWI: This Week's Featured Minnesota DWI Case

The Minnesota DWI Case Of The Week is State v. Vredenburg (Decided May 13, 2024, Minnesota Court of Appeals, Unpublished) which stands for the proposition that out-of-court statements are admissible to establish the element of probable cause in a DWI test refusal case.

In Vredenburg, the police encountered the Defendant, apparently impaired, causing a disturbance near her former boyfriend’s home before later seeing her car driving away from the area. Police momentarily lost sight of the car, but soon saw it parked and found Vredenburg walking nearby with the key to the car in her pocket. Police arrested her on suspicion of impaired driving and the state charged her with chemical-test refusal. Vredenburg appealed from her test-refusal conviction, arguing that admitting evidence of statements provided by a bystander violated both the evidentiary rule prohibiting hearsay and Vredenburg’s constitutional right to confront witnesses.

A man reported to Rochester police that his former girlfriend, Mickela Vredenburg, was outside his house yelling and hitting his front door. Officers arrived and found Vredenburg. They noticed that she smelled of an alcoholic beverage, she slurred her speech, and her balance was unstable. An officer offered to drive Vredenburg home, but she declined. She told the officers that she had not driven there and that she had already arranged for a ride. She walked away.

Officers left but were soon dispatched to return. Vredenburg was at the house again, this time reportedly banging her head against the back door. Police did not find her at the house. But they knew she drove a black Ford Edge, and about a block away an officer saw a car of that description speeding past. The officer turned onto a different street, attempting to intercept the Ford. She soon found the Ford parked on the street, empty and situated partially in the grass, near two townhomes.

The officer stopped immediately behind the Ford and beside a bystander who was standing in the street. She got out and asked the bystander, “Did you see where that woman went?” The bystander, who lived nearby, said, “Yeah, she went right straight through there,” pointing between two townhomes. The officer walked in the indicated direction but did not immediately find Vredenburg. She returned to the bystander and questioned her further about what she had seen, asking for a description of the driver.

Meanwhile, other officers found Vredenburg walking in a direction away from where the officer had found her parked car. Vredenburg denied that she had been driving, but the officers were not persuaded. They arrested her on suspicion of drunk driving, and, searching her after the arrest, found the key to the parked Ford.

The Defendant was taken to the Olmsted County detention center where she was asked to submit to chemical testing.  Ms.Vredenburg refused testing and was subsequently charged with 3rd Degree DWI Refusal. The Defendant was convicted after a jury trial and on appeal the Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction stating:

"We are unconvinced by Vredenburg’s challenge to the district court’s decision to admit evidence of the bystander’s statements to the officer. Vredenburg is correct that hearsay statements are generally inadmissible at trial. See Minn. R. Evid. 802. She is also correct that, relatedly, testimonial out-of-court statements are generally not admissible unless the defendant has an opportunity to cross-examine the declarant. See U.S. Const, amend. VI; Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 53-54 (2004); State v. Sutter, 959 N.W.2d 760, 764-65 (Minn. 2021). But these prohibitions are inapplicable here. An out- of-court statement repeated at trial is not hearsay unless it is offered to prove the truth of the matter asserted. Minn. R. Evid. 801(c). And identically, “[t]he [Confrontation] Clause . . . does not bar the use of testimonial statements for purposes other than establishing the truth of the matter asserted.” Crawford, 541 U.S. at 59 n.9; see also Andersen v. State, 830 N.W.2d 1, 9 (Minn. 2013). Vredenburg’s evidentiary and constitutional challenges to the district court’s decision to admit evidence of the bystander’s out-of-court statements therefore fails if the statements were admissible for some other reason."

"We have no difficulty concluding that the challenged statements were offered for some purpose other than the truth of the matter asserted. The supreme court has explained that “[Refusing a chemical test is not a crime . . . unless it can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that an officer had ‘probable cause to believe the person was driving, operating, or in physical control of a motor vehicle’ while impaired.” State v. Koppi, 798 N.W.2d 358, 362 (Minn. 2011) (quoting Minn. Stat. § 169A.51, subd. 1(b) (2010)). The bystander’s statements to the officer supported the officer’s suspicion that Vredenburg had just driven the car that the officer found parked. Officers may rely on eyewitness statements to establish reasonable suspicion to detain or probable cause to arrest. See City of Minnetonka v. Shepherd, 420 N.W.2d 887, 888, 891 (Minn. 1988) (holding that police had “sufficient information to reasonably suspect that the driver of the car in question was intoxicated” based on a gas-station attendant’s report to police “that he had observed an intoxicated driver leave the gas station”). The bystander’s statements about Vredenburg exiting the car and walking away from it were therefore admissible to prove a circumstance that establishes probable cause to suspect her of impaired driving. In other words, the bystander’s statement that Vredenburg was driving was not offered as substantive evidence that she was in fact driving, but to support the conclusion of police that they had probable cause to believe that she had been. Because the statements were admissible to provide the officer’s basis for probable cause, which is a purpose other than the truth of the matter asserted, it was not subject to exclusion by either the rule prohibiting hearsay or the Confrontation Clause."

Moral Of The Story: Sometimes a woman scorned feels the fury.

If you or a loved one have been charged with a Minnesota DWI, feel free to contact Minnesota DWI Lawyer, F. T. Sessoms at (612) 344-1505 for answers to all of your Minnesota DWI and DUI questions.

Minnesota DWI Attorney F. T. Sessoms Blogs on Minnesota DWI: This Week's Featured Minnesota DWI Case

The Minnesota DWI Case Of The Week is State v. Street (Decided May 6, 2024, Minnesota Court of Appeals, Unpublished) which stands for the proposition that out-of-state convictions may not be used to calculate a defendant's criminal history score without proper documentation.

In Street, the Defendant pled guilty to Felony DWI without any agreement as to sentencing except the State did agree to dismiss the remaining charges. The district court sentenced Street to 57 months in prison, which represented a bottom-of-the-box presumptive sentence based on Street’s criminal history score of five. 

According to the PSI, the score of five included one custody-status point and four felony points. The PSI assigned three felony points for convictions that allegedly occurred in the state of Georgia. The fourth felony point was for Street’s 2019 Minnesota conviction of criminal vehicular operation with an alcohol concentration of 0.08 or more. The PSI identified each Georgia conviction by case number, date of conviction, and sentence, and included a description, date, and location for each convicted offense. The PSI did not include, and the state did not offer, any evidence to substantiate these out-of-state convictions. At sentencing, Street did not object to his criminal-history score.

On appeal, Mr. Street claimed the district court abused its discretion by sentencing him with a criminal-history score that included unsubstantiated out-of-state convictions. The Minnesota Court of Appeals agreed and remanded the case for resentencing stating:

"An offender’s criminal-history score may include out-of-state convictions if certain requirements are met. See Minn. Sent’g Guidelines 2.B.5. The guidelines provide that an out-of-state conviction “may be counted as a felony only if [the offense] would both be defined as a felony in Minnesota, and the offender received a sentence that in Minnesota would be a felony-level sentence, which includes the equivalent of a stay of imposition.” Minn. Sent’g Guidelines 2.B.5.b (2020) (emphasis omitted). In assigning weight to an out-of-state offense, “[s]ection 2.B.1 governs the weight of a prior felony conviction from a jurisdiction other than Minnesota, and [the weight] must be based on the severity level of the equivalent Minnesota felony offense.” Minn. Sent’g Guidelines, 2.B.5.C (2020)."

***

"Although the state need not present certified copies of out-of-state convictions for the convictions to be included in a defendant’s criminal-history score, the state must provide “persuasive evidence that sufficiently substitutes for the official, certified record of conviction.” Id. at 711-12. If the state fails to meet its burden, the proper remedy is to reverse and remand for resentencing. See id. at 715. But if the defendant fails to object to his criminal-history score at sentencing, the state may “further develop the sentencing record” on remand to allow the district court to determine whether the relevant out-of-state convictions were properly included in the defendant’s criminal-history score. Outlaw, 748 N.W.2d at 356; see also State v. Strobel, 921 N.W.2d 563, 577 (Minn App. 2018), affd, 932 N.W.2d 303 (Minn 2019)."

***

"The record shows that the state failed to meet its burden of proving that the three alleged Georgia convictions were valid and would constitute felonies under Minnesota law. See Maley, 714 N.W.2d at 711. As Street correctly notes, the state did not present any evidence to support Street’s alleged Georgia convictions, nor did the PSI include any documentation to verify them. Accordingly, the state failed to present “persuasive evidence” that these convictions were properly included in Street’s criminal-history score. See id. at 710-12 (concluding that the state’s reliance on a sentencing worksheet alone was insufficient to substantiate the defendant’s out-of-state convictions); see also State v. Griffin, 336 N.W.2d 519, 525 (Minn. 1983) (concluding that the state met its burden of proof by providing the district court with “considerable documentation” of the defendant’s out-of-state conviction). We therefore conclude that the district court abused its discretion by sentencing Street based on a criminal-history score that included unsubstantiated out-of-state convictions, and we reverse and remand for resentencing. See Maley, 714 N.W.2d at 711, 715. Because Street did not object to his criminal-history score at sentencing, the state may supplement the sentencing record on remand. See Outlaw, 748 N.W.2d at 356."

Moral Of The Story: You can't keep score without some paper.

If you or a loved one have been charged with a Minnesota DWI, feel free to contact Minnesota DWI Attorney, F. T. Sessoms at (612) 344-1505 for answers to all of your Minnesota DWI and DUI questions.