OPINION GILDEA, Chief Justice. Relators Idowu Odunlade, Kimberly Larson, Charles Enck, Kent Lageson, Timothy Wesbrook, Jose Llangari, and Andrea Kral ("relators") represent a putative class including all residential property owners in three Minneapolis neighborhoods: Camden, Near North, and Phillips. Relators challenge the assessed values respondent City of Minneapolis placed on relators' properties, and allege that because their properties were overvalued, relators were required to...
OPINION STRAS, Justice. This appeal arises out of three biting incidents involving a dog owned by respondent Mitchell Sawh. After the first bite, appellant City of Lino Lakes ("the City") designated Sawh's dog as "potentially dangerous." After the second bite, the City designated the dog as "dangerous." And after the third bite, the City ordered the dog's destruction. Sawh appealed the City's decisions by writ of certiorari. The court of appeals reversed the City's decisions, holding that...
OPINION STRAS, Justice. This case relates to a title insurer's obligations when a policyholder claims that title to a covered parcel of property is unmarketable and that the policyholder has suffered damages due to the unmarketability of the title. Respondent Mattson Ridge, LLC, purchased the property at issue and obtained a title insurance policy from appellant Ticor Title Insurance Co. An ambiguity in the legal description of the property, however, prevented Mattson Ridge from reselling the...
OPINION PER CURIAM. In Martin v. Dicklich, we ordered Donald Dicklich, the Saint Louis County Auditor ("the County Auditor") to replace the name of Kerry Gauthier with the name of Erik Simonson as the Democratic-Farmer-Labor ("DFL") endorsed candidate for state representative, House District 7B, on the November 2012 general election ballot. Martin v. Dicklich, No. A12-1588, Order at 3, 2012 WL 4465588 (Minn. filed Sept. 25, 2012). Jay Fosle, who had previously declared his write-in...
Considered and decided by the court without oral argument. OPINION PER CURIAM. Ken Martin and Erik Simonson filed a petition pursuant to Minn.Stat. 204B.44 (2010). Petitioners seek an order requiring that respondents Donald Dicklich, the St. Louis County Auditor ("the County Auditor"), and Mark Ritchie, the Minnesota Secretary of State, place Simonson's name on the ballot for the 2012 general election as the candidate of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor ("DFL") Party for the office of State...
OPINION PER CURIAM. On April 5, 2012, petitioner James D. Schowalter, in his capacity as Commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Management and Budget ("Commissioner"), filed a Verified Complaint pursuant to the bond validation procedures in Minn.Stat. 16A.99 (Supp.2011). In this original action, the Commissioner seeks validation of certain tobacco appropriation bonds to be issued to refund, in advance of maturity, outstanding tobacco securitization bonds issued in 2011. The only...
OPINION DIETZEN, Justice. A Hennepin County jury found appellant Alfunda Scruggs guilty of first-degree premeditated murder and second-degree intentional murder arising out of the February 4, 2010, death of Michael Fonta by strangulation. The district court entered judgment of conviction on the first-degree murder charge and imposed a life sentence without the possibility of release. In this direct appeal, Scruggs argues that the court erred in: (1) denying his motion to suppress his...
OPINION ANDERSON, G. BARRY, Justice. The question presented by this case is whether the Wright County District Court erred when it granted appellant R.H.B.'s expungement petition. In May 2009 the State charged R.H.B. with first- and third-degree assault on the ground that R.H.B. injured a young child in his care. In November 2009 a jury found R.H.B. not guilty of both charges and the district court entered a judgment of acquittal. R.H.B. then petitioned the court for an order sealing the...
OPINION STRAS, Justice. The question presented by this case is whether statutes of limitations apply to actions for declaratory judgment. Because the Uniform Declaratory Judgments Act, Minn. Stat. ch. 555 (2010), is a procedural device through which parties may vindicate substantive legal rights, we conclude that an action for declaratory judgment is barred by an applicable statute of limitations to the same extent that the same cause of action would be barred in a nondeclaratory proceeding....
OPINION ANDERSON, G. BARRY, Justice. Appellant Tylar James Hokanson was found guilty by a jury of first-degree murder while committing malicious punishment of a child with a past pattern of child abuse for the death of his stepson, 17-month-old Nicholas Arthur Miller. In this consolidated appeal, appellant argues that he is entitled to relief because: (1) his right to present an alternative perpetrator defense was violated when the district court denied defense counsel unfettered access to...
OPINION STRAS, Justice. Following a jury trial, appellant Kenneth Octavius Wallace was convicted of first-degree felony murder, attempted second-degree criminal sexual conduct, and second-degree assault. We affirmed Wallace's convictions on direct appeal in 1997. State v. Wallace, 558 N.W.2d 469 (Minn. 1997). More than fourteen years later, on April 20, 2011, Wallace filed his second petition for postconviction relief, which the postconviction court summarily denied. Because we conclude...
OPINION DIETZEN, Justice. This case presents the question of whether a vehicle may be judicially forfeited under Minn.Stat. 169A.63 (2010) when the vehicle's driver is not convicted of the designated offense of second-degree driving while impaired. Respondent Laura Patino is the owner of the subject vehicle, which was operated by her boyfriend on April 24, 2010, when he was stopped, arrested for driving while impaired (DWI), and the vehicle was impounded. The boyfriend was charged with...
OPINION DIETZEN, Justice. The issue before us is whether appellants, who were employees of a contractor that performed work pursuant to a municipal contract with the City of Minneapolis (City), may recover for the contractor's alleged breach of a prevailing wage provision in the contract. Appellants Oscar Caldas, et al., were employed by respondent Affordable Granite & Stone, Inc. (AGS), to perform work at the Minneapolis Convention Center pursuant to a contract between AGS and the City....
OPINION DIETZEN, Justice. The issue presented in this case is whether the tax court has subject-matter jurisdiction to consider the value of the leasehold interest in real property adjacent to the tax parcel on appeal. The Ramsey County Assessor determined that the fair market value of the tax parcel, which is improved by a Macy's department store operated by respondent Federated Retail Holdings, Inc., was $17,000,000 for the assessment dates of January 2, 2006, and January 2, 2007. The...
OPINION ANDERSON, PAUL H., Justice. On February 1, 2011, the Hennepin County District Court convicted Javaris Eugene Milton of one count of first-degree felony murder and one count of attempted first-degree felony murder. The court then sentenced Milton to: (1) life imprisonment with the possibility of parole for the murder of Dontae Johnson, and (2) a concurrent sentence of 220 months for the attempted murder of C.W. On appeal, Milton makes the following three arguments: (1) the district...
OPINION ANDERSON, PAUL H., Justice. A Hennepin County jury found Brandon Dominic Cox guilty of first-degree felony murder, second-degree intentional murder, and being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm for the shooting death of cab driver James Moody. Following the jury's verdicts, the Hennepin County District Court convicted Cox of each count, including the second-degree murder count. The court then sentenced Cox to life in prison with the possibility of parole on the first-...
OPINION ANDERSON, PAUL H., Justice. This case requires us to determine whether the appellants, six banks, pleaded a negligent misrepresentation claim with particularity under Minn. R. Civ. P. 9.02. The Banks allege that the negligent misrepresentation of the respondent, James H. Bedard, Inc., caused them to be damaged when the Housing and Redevelopment Authority of the City of Brainerd defaulted on bonds held by the Banks. More specifically, in November 2003 the Banks purchased $3.3 million...
OPINION GILDEA, Chief Justice. Appellant Jerome Emmanuel Davis was convicted of aiding and abetting first-degree felony murder for the shooting death of Armando Calix. Minn.Stat. 609.185(a)(3), 609.05 (2010). The district court sentenced Davis to life in prison. On appeal, Davis claims that numerous errors entitle him to a new trial. We disagree, and therefore affirm Davis's conviction. Armando Calix bled to death on the lawn outside of his apartment shortly after being shot in the neck...
OPINION PAGE, Justice. Appellant Steven Bernard Radke was arrested and charged with first-degree premeditated murder, in violation of Minn. Stat. 609.185(a)(1) (2010), for causing the June 20, 2007, death of Darrell Buesgens. At trial, Radke admitted shooting Buesgens, but claimed that he did so in self-defense and without premeditation. The jury, rejecting Radke's self-defense claim, found Radke guilty of first-degree premeditated murder, and the district court sentenced Radke to life in...
OPINION GILDEA, Chief Justice. In this subrogation action, appellant RAM Mutual Insurance Company seeks to recover payment it made to its insured for the repair of water damage allegedly caused by the negligence of respondent Rusty Rohde, the commercial tenant of RAM's insured. The district court granted Rohde's motion for summary judgment, dismissing RAM's subrogation claim as a matter of law, relying on the court of appeals decision in United Fire & Casualty Co. v. Bruggeman, 505 N.W....
