State of Minnesota v. Vida Kay Bjorklund

This opinion will be unpublished and
may not be cited except as provided by
Minn. Stat. § 480A.08, subd. 3 (2012).
STATE OF MINNESOTA
IN COURT OF APPEALS
A14-0074
State of Minnesota,
Respondent,
vs.
Vida Kay Bjorklund,
Appellant.
Filed March 2, 2015
Affirmed
Johnson, Judge
Crow Wing County District Court
File No. 18-CR-12-1196
Lori Swanson, Attorney General, St. Paul, Minnesota; and
Donald F. Ryan, Crow Wing County Attorney, Candace Prigge, Assistant County
Attorney, Brainerd, Minnesota (for respondent)
Cathryn Middlebrook, Chief Appellate Public Defender, David W. Merchant, Assistant
Public Defender, St. Paul, Minnesota (for appellant)
Considered and decided by Reyes, Presiding Judge; Worke, Judge; and Johnson,
Judge.
UNPUBLISHED OPINION
JOHNSON, Judge
A Crow Wing County jury found Vida Kay Bjorklund guilty of aiding an offender
to avoid arrest. On appeal, Bjorklund argues that the district court erred by failing to
obtain her personal waiver of her right to a jury trial when she stipulated to two elements
of the offense and by failing to instruct the jury on the requirement that it reach a
unanimous verdict. We affirm.
FACTS
On the evening of March 1, 2012, Crow Wing County Sheriff’s Deputies Todd
Holk and Phillip Stanley went to Bjorklund’s home to arrest M.B. for his failure to
appear on a felony charge. Bjorklund and M.B. had divorced in November 2011, but law
enforcement records still showed Bjorklund’s home as M.B.’s place of residence.
Deputy Holk had viewed photographs of M.B. and Bjorklund earlier that evening.
As the deputies approached the house, Deputy Holk saw through a window that M.B. was
standing inside the house before M.B. ducked away from the window. Deputy Holk
knocked loudly on the front door and informed M.B. that they had a warrant for his
arrest. Deputy Holk received no response and continued to knock on the door.
As Deputy Holk was knocking, Bjorklund drove into the driveway. She asked the
deputies why they were there; they explained that they were executing a warrant for the
arrest of M.B. and had seen him inside the house. She stated that there was no one in the
house and demanded that the deputies leave. Deputy Holk asked Bjorklund whether she
had a key to the house; she said that she did not have a key with her. Bjorklund called
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911 and asked to have someone “come out and take these officers off my property.” The
dispatcher told her that the deputies were there to execute an arrest warrant. She called
911 two more times to complain about the officers being on her property, and the
dispatcher told her to stop calling. After Deputy Holk requested back-up, three more
law-enforcement officers came to the home. Deputy Holk kicked open the front door.
Once inside, the officers found M.B. in a bedroom. The officers arrested M.B. and
brought him to the county jail.
While awaiting arraignment, M.B. called Bjorklund from the jail and asked her to
bring him a phone card. Bjorklund told him to “plead the fifth” and “don’t say nothin’.”
She also indicated that she was consulting with an attorney about M.B.’s arrest. Before
the call ended, she said, “we’ll figure it out, okay?”
On March 19, 2012, the state charged Bjorklund with one count of aiding an
offender to avoid arrest, in violation of Minn. Stat. § 609.495, subd. 1(a) (2012). Before
trial, the parties stipulated “that [M.B.] was charged with a felony level offense on
December 27, 2011, that Vida Kay Bjorklund was an alleged victim of that crime and the
warrant for arrest was for failing to appear in court for that offense.” The case was tried
on one day in July 2013. The state called two witnesses: Deputy Holk and Deputy
Stanley. The state also played for the jury audio-recordings of Bjorklund’s three 911
calls and M.B.’s call to Bjorklund from jail. M.B. testified for the defense, and
Bjorklund testified on her own behalf.
During the instructions conference, the district court expressed concerns about
whether the stipulation was consistent with the evidence presented at trial. Specifically,
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the district court asked counsel whether the state sought to prove that Bjorklund aided
M.B.’s pending felony charges or M.B.’s failure to appear. The stipulation stated that the
arrest warrant was for M.B.’s failure to appear, but Deputy Holk had testified that “the
warrant was for introducing methamphetamine to a child.” The prosecutor clarified that
the arrest warrant was for M.B.’s failure to appear on the pending felony offense. The
district court also identified some confusion concerning the stipulation’s statement that
Bjorklund was a victim of M.B’s predicate offense; the district court observed that the
state’s evidence did not indicate that Bjorklund was a victim. The parties agreed to
amend the stipulation to say that Bjorklund was a witness to M.B’s predicate offense.
Ultimately, the district court incorporated the stipulation into the marshaling instruction
as follows:
The elements of aiding an offender are:
First, the person aided by the Defendant committed a
crime.
Second, the Defendant knew that the other person had
committed a crime. To know requires only that the Defendant
believed that the other person had committed the crime.
The Defendant has stipulated that [M.B.] was charged
with a felony level offense on December 27, 2011, that Vida
Bjorklund was a witness to that crime, and that a warrant for
[M.B.’s] arrest was for failing to appear in court for that
offense.
Third, the Defendant harbored, concealed, or aided the
other person. . . .
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The jury found Bjorklund guilty. The district court imposed a sentence of one
year and one day of imprisonment but stayed execution of the sentence and ordered
probation and jail time. Bjorklund appeals.
DECISION
I. Right to Jury Trial
Bjorklund argues that the district court erred by failing to obtain her personal
waiver of her right to a jury trial when the district court accepted the stipulation
concerning M.B.’s predicate offense and the arrest warrant.
A defendant has a constitutional right to a jury trial if she is charged with an
offense that is punishable by incarceration. U.S. Const. amend. VI; Minn. Const. art. I,
§§ 4, 6; State v. Weltzin, 630 N.W.2d 406, 410 (Minn. 2001). The right to a jury trial
includes the right to be tried by a jury on each element of the charged offense. State v.
Kuhlmann, 806 N.W.2d 844, 848 (Minn. 2011). A defendant may, however, waive her
right to a jury trial with respect to one or more elements of the charged offense by
stipulating to facts that satisfy that element. Id. In Minnesota, the right to a jury trial on
each element of the charged offense must be waived “personally, in writing or on the
record in open court, after being advised by the court of the right to trial by jury.” Minn.
R. Crim. P. 26.01, subd. 1(2)(a).
This court applies a de novo standard of review when analyzing whether a
criminal defendant has been denied the right to a jury trial. Kuhlmann, 806 N.W.2d at
848-49. Because Bjorklund did not object to the district court’s failure to obtain her
personal waiver, we review for plain error. Id. at 852; see also Minn. R. Crim. P. 31.02.
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Under the plain-error test, an appellant is not entitled to relief on an issue to which no
objection was made at trial unless (1) there is an error, (2) the error is plain, and (3) the
error affects the appellant’s substantial rights. State v. Griller, 583 N.W.2d 736, 740
(Minn. 1998). An error is “plain” if it is clear or obvious under current law, and an error
is clear or obvious if it “contravenes a rule, case law, or a standard of conduct, or when it
disregards well-established and longstanding legal principles.” State v. Brown, 792
N.W.2d 815, 823 (Minn. 2011). An error affects the defendant’s substantial rights “if the
error was prejudicial and affected the outcome of the case.” Griller, 583 N.W.2d at 741.
If the first three requirements of the plain-error test are satisfied, we must consider the
fourth requirement, whether the error “seriously affects the fairness, integrity or public
reputation of judicial proceedings.” State v. Washington, 693 N.W.2d 195, 204 (Minn.
2005) (quotation omitted). If we conclude that any requirement of the plain-error test is
not satisfied, we need not consider the other requirements. State v. Brown, 815 N.W.2d
609, 620 (Minn. 2012).
The statute setting forth the offense of which Bjorklund was convicted states that a
person commits a crime if she
harbors, conceals, aids, or assists by word or acts another
whom the actor knows or has reason to know has committed
a crime under the laws of this or another state or of the
United States with intent that such offender shall avoid or
escape from arrest, trial, conviction, or punishment.
Minn. Stat. § 609.495, subd. 1(a). In this case, the parties’ stipulation essentially
established that M.B. committed a crime and that Bjorklund knew that he committed a
crime, which left the jury to decide only whether Bjorklund harbored, concealed, aided,
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or assisted M.B. in his effort to avoid or escape. See State v. Hager, 727 N.W.2d 668,
673 (Minn. App. 2007) (explaining elements of aiding offender).
Our review of the record confirms Bjorklund’s argument that the district court did
not obtain her personal waiver of her right to a jury trial on the stipulated elements. The
state does not contend that the district court did not err by failing to do so, which
effectively is a concession of that issue. The state’s responsive brief is confined to the
third requirement of the plain-error test, which asks whether the absence of a personal
waiver affected Bjorklund’s substantial rights. See Griller, 583 N.W.2d at 741. In light
of the existing caselaw, the district court erred by not obtaining Bjorklund’s personal
waiver of her right to a jury trial on the two stipulated elements, and the error was plain.
See Kuhlmann, 806 N.W.2d at 852.
Accordingly, we will analyze the third requirement of the plain-error test, which
asks whether the district court’s “error was prejudicial and affected the outcome of the
case.” Griller, 583 N.W.2d at 741. Bjorklund bears a “heavy burden” of persuasion on
the third requirement of the plain-error test. Id.; see also State v. Davis, 820 N.W.2d 525,
535 (Minn. 2012). Bjorklund contends that the district court’s error was prejudicial
because she did not benefit from the stipulation. In Kuhlmann, the supreme court held
that the defendant was not prejudiced by the district court’s failure to obtain a waiver of
his jury-trial rights on the previous-conviction element of his offense, in part because the
stipulation benefitted him by “protecting [him] from the possibility that the jury might
improperly use his previous convictions as evidence that he committed the current
offenses.” 806 N.W.2d at 853. In this case, the stipulation made it unnecessary for the
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state to introduce evidence that M.B. had committed a crime when he gave
methamphetamine to a child and that Bjorklund witnessed the crime. If the jury had
heard the allegations against M.B., and had learned that Bjorklund witnessed M.B.’s
predicate offense, the jury easily could have believed that Bjorklund was partially
responsible for that crime, especially in light of her supportive statements to M.B. when
he called her from jail. In fact, the record indicates that counsel for the parties entered
into the stipulation to avoid any reference to the child who allegedly was given
methamphetamine. As in Kuhlmann, the stipulation in this case protected Bjorklund
from the likelihood of prejudice. Thus, we reject her argument that the stipulation did not
benefit her.
Bjorklund also contends that the stipulation prejudiced her because it was the only
evidence in the record to satisfy the knowledge element of the offense. In Kuhlmann, the
supreme court held that the district court’s failure to obtain the defendant’s jury-trial
waiver on stipulated elements was not prejudicial “[b]ecause the [s]tate could have
readily proven” the stipulated elements. Id. In this case, it appears that there was no
dispute that M.B. had committed a crime and that Bjorklund knew about it, which
indicates that the state could have proven the first and second elements, if necessary.
While discussing the stipulation, the prosecutor stated that Bjorklund knew that M.B. had
given a statement in which he admitted giving methamphetamine to a child, and
Bjorklund’s counsel did not disagree with the prosecutor’s statement. Bjorklund does not
address whether the state could have proved the stipulated elements; she merely contends
that the state did not offer any other evidence to prove the knowledge element. But the
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reason for the absence of such evidence is obvious: the stipulation itself. In light of the
stipulation, it would have been error for the district court to allow the state to introduce
evidence of M.B.’s crime or Bjorklund’s knowledge of the crime. See State v.
Berkelman, 355 N.W.2d 394, 396-97 (Minn. 1984). Bjorklund has not demonstrated that,
absent the stipulation, the state would not have been able to prove the first and second
elements.
Thus, the district court’s error in failing to obtain Bjorklund’s personal waiver of
her right to a jury trial did not affect the outcome of the trial and, therefore, is not
reversible error.
II. Jury Instructions
Bjorklund also argues that the district court erred when instructing the jury by
failing to “identify the crime committed by [M.B.] which Bjorklund was alleged to have
aided.”
A district court must instruct the jury in a way that “fairly and adequately
explain[s] the law of the case” and does not “materially misstate[] the applicable law.”
State v. Koppi, 798 N.W.2d 358, 362 (Minn. 2011). A district court has “considerable
latitude” in selecting language for jury instructions. State v. Gatson, 801 N.W.2d 134,
147 (Minn. 2011) (quotation omitted). Accordingly, we apply an abuse-of-discretion
standard of review to a district court’s jury instructions. Koppi, 798 N.W.2d at 361.
Because Bjorklund did not object to the jury instruction at trial, we review for plain error.
State v. Baird, 654 N.W.2d 105, 113 (Minn. 2002); Griller, 583 N.W.2d at 740-41.
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Bjorklund’s argument is based on the requirement that the jury reach a unanimous
verdict. See Minn. R. Crim. P. 26.01, subd. 1(5). “Where jury instructions allow for
possible significant disagreement among jurors as to what acts the defendant committed,
the instructions violate the defendant’s right to a unanimous verdict.” State v. Stempf,
627 N.W.2d 352, 354 (Minn. App. 2001). If a defendant is charged with a violation of
section 609.495, subdivision 1(a), a district court must specify “what predicate conduct
by the original offender constitutes the crime.” Hager, 727 N.W.2d at 673. “Specificity
in an aiding-the-offender offense instruction is important,” because “unless the full jury
identifies the offender’s criminal act that the accused has aided, the accused may be
denied the right to a unanimous verdict.” Id. at 673-74.
Bjorklund contends that the district court erred because, she asserts, the stipulation
refers to two predicate offenses that were committed by M.B., without requiring the jury
to unanimously agree on which offense Bjorklund aided. According to Bjorklund, the
two offenses are, first, M.B.’s commission of a felony for giving methamphetamine to a
child and, second, M.B.’s failure to appear in court on that felony charge. The state
contends, however, that the stipulation identifies only one predicate offense, namely, the
felony for giving methamphetamine to a child. Although the stipulation refers to M.B.’s
failure to appear, the stipulation does not characterize his failure to appear as a separate
predicate crime. The reference to M.B.’s failure to appear seems to have been included
in the stipulation only to allow the jury to make a connection between M.B.’s predicate
crime and M.B.’s arrest, which was the occasion when Bjorklund aided him. Because
Bjorklund stipulated to only one predicate crime, it was unnecessary for the district court
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to instruct the jury on the unanimity requirement. Thus, the district court did not err in its
jury instructions.
Affirmed.
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