Blawat v. Huener, A19-0605
| Decision Date | 13 January 2020 |
| Docket Number | A19-0605 |
| Parties | Brian John Blawat, et al., Appellants, Floyd Blawat, Plaintiff, v. Ben Huener, et al., Respondents. |
| Court | Minnesota Court of Appeals |
This opinion will be unpublished and may not be cited except as provided by Minn. Stat. § 480A.08, subd. 3 (2018).
Affirmed
Roseau County District Court
Ryan M. Theis, Hellmuth & Johnson, Edina, Minnesota (for appellants)
Keith Ellison, Attorney General, Liz Kramer, Solicitor General, St. Paul, Minnesota (for respondents)
Considered and decided by Worke, Presiding Judge; Connolly, Judge; and Jesson, Judge.
UNPUBLISHED OPINION
Appellants challenge the district court's dismissal of their claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (2012), as well as their claims for conversion, replevin, false arrest, and vicarious liability arising from an encounter with respondent, a Department of Natural Resources (DNR) conservation officer. Because the district court did not err when it concluded that qualified, official, and vicarious official immunity shielded respondents from appellants' claims, we affirm.
Appellants Brian Blawat and Nancy Kasprowicz live in Roseau County, where respondent Ben Huener works as a conservation officer for respondent Minnesota DNR. Blawat and Officer Huener have an extensive history of negative interactions, which includes Officer Huener issuing several citations to Blawat. Officer Huener has also told community members that Blawat was "the biggest poacher in Roseau County" and that he was going to "get" Blawat.
The events underlying appellants' claims occurred on November 11, 2016. That morning, while Blawat and his uncle1 were deer hunting, Blawat's uncle legally shot and killed a deer. Blawat tagged the deer and transported it for his uncle, with the expectation that Blawat would carve the deer and mount its antlers for display. Blawat was also transporting a set of antlers for a friend in his vehicle.
Later, appellants traveled in Blawat's vehicle to a large soybean field that he farmed. Appellants drove a half mile from the entrance into the field, intending to stop potential poachers or other illegal hunting activity. After dark, appellants returned to exit the field, but they encountered Officer Huener's vehicle blocking their path. When appellants approached the exit, Officer Huener activated his vehicle's emergency lights.
After stopping the vehicle, Officer Huener asked Blawat whether he was hunting in the field. Blawat responded that neither he nor Kasprowicz had been hunting. Officer Huener then checked appellants' licenses and guns, which were unloaded. During this encounter, Officer Huener alleged several times that Blawat was hunting with bait, which Blawat denied. In response to Officer Huener's question about the deer and antlers in the vehicle, Blawat explained that he was transporting the deer for his uncle and the antlers for a friend.
Officer Huener seized appellants' guns, cameras, memory cards, a bracket and camera stand, the deer antlers, and the deer Blawat's uncle had shot that morning. He then demanded that Blawat take a preliminary breath test (PBT). Blawat eventually agreed to perform the PBT after Officer Huener questioned if he was refusing the test. The PBT registered a 0.00 blood-alcohol content. This encounter lasted for around one hour.
Appellants sued respondents in March 2017, alleging claims of conversion, replevin, constitutional violations under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, false arrest, and vicarious liability. After appellants filed their civil case, the State of Minnesota charged Blawat and Kasprowicz for hunting with bait in violation of Minn. Stat. § 97B.328, subd. 1 (2016), and also charged Blawat with transporting a deer without the licensee first completing properregistration in violation of Minn. Stat. § 97A.535, subd. 4 (2016). The state dismissed the criminal charge against Kasprowicz in July 2017. Blawat moved to dismiss the criminal charges against him and suppress the evidence derived from the encounter with Officer Huener. At the omnibus hearing, Officer Huener testified to his version of the events surrounding his encounter with appellants. Following the parties' submission of legal memoranda, the omnibus judge denied Blawat's motions, finding probable cause for the charges against him and reasonable suspicion for the stop of his vehicle. In February 2018, the state dismissed the charges against Blawat in exchange for a guilty plea in an unrelated case.
After appellants twice amended their complaint, respondents moved to dismiss under Minn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(e) for failure to state a claim. The district court granted respondents' motion on all of appellants' claims, except for their return of property claim under Minn. Stat. § 626.04 (2018).2 This appeal follows.
The heart of this appeal is the interplay between Minn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(e) and Minn. R. Evid. 201. Rule 12.02(e) provides that a case can be dismissed for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. We review such dismissals de novo, accepting the facts alleged in the complaint as true while construing all reasonable inferences in favor ofthe nonmoving party. Hebert v. City of Fifty Lakes, 744 N.W.2d 226, 229 (Minn. 2008). Dismissal under rule 12.02(e) is appropriate "only if it appears to a certainty that no facts, which could be introduced consistent with the pleading, exist which would support granting the relief demanded." Bahr v. Capella Univ., 788 N.W.2d 76, 80 (Minn. 2010) (quotation omitted). Legal conclusions within a complaint do not bind a reviewing court. Hebert, 744 N.W.2d at 235.
Minn. R. Evid. 201 permits a court to take judicial notice of adjudicative facts in civil cases. Rule 201(b) states that "[a] judicially noticed fact must be one not subject to reasonable dispute in that it is either (1) generally known within the territorial jurisdiction of the trial court or (2) capable of accurate and ready determination by resort to sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned."
Appellants argue that by taking judicial notice of a prior omnibus order in Blawat's criminal case when it denied a motion to dismiss the criminal complaint, as well as a police report authored by Officer Huener, the district court erred because it relied on contested facts offered by Officer Huener. Appellants further argue that by doing this, the district court violated rule 12, which requires the court to view all facts in the complaint as true and all inferences in the light most favorable to appellants. See Hebert, 744 N.W.2d at 229.
Specifically, appellants argue that there are three largely contested facts cited as uncontroverted and relied on by the district court in its order dismissing their complaint. They are (1) that Officer Huener received an anonymous complaint that Blawat was hunting with bait, (2) that Officer Huener observed Blawat hunting with bait for threeconsecutive days before initiating the stop, and (3) that the "bait" was only 150 yards from where Officer Huener observed Blawat hunting.
We have reviewed appellants' amended complaint. Paragraphs 27 and 28 contain the relevant allegations. Paragraph 27 provides:
After tagging his deer, [Blawat's uncle] left the area to attend a Veteran's Day event. [Appellants] proceeded later in the day to a large stubble soybean field farmed by Brian Blawat to watch for potential poachers and other improper hunting activity on the property. They drove far out onto the stubble field, over one-half mile from the entrance to the field, which is located on its southeast corner.
Paragraph 28 provides:
After dark, when [Appellants] drove to the exit from the field at the southeast corner of the property, they encountered Officer Huener blocking the exit with his vehicle. Officer Huener activated the flashing lights on his vehicle. From his location at the entrance, Officer Huener had little or no view of Brian Blawat's vehicle earlier, when it was out in the field.
These two paragraphs do indeed contest the second and third facts set out in the district court's order dismissing the case. However, a review of the amended complaint reveals no allegations that contradict the district court's conclusion that Officer Huener received an anonymous complaint that Blawat was hunting with bait.
We acknowledge the apparent tension between Minn. R. Civ. P. 12 and Minn. R. Evid. 201. We are of the view that caselaw would permit the district court to take judicial notice of facts in the omnibus order because the order is not subject to reasonable dispute and the facts contained within are "capable of accurate and ready determination by resortto sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned." Minn. R. Evid. 201(b)(2) (emphasis added).
In In re Welfare of Clausen, the supreme court held that the district court did not err when it took judicial notice of the files and records of its juvenile and criminal divisions under Minn. R. Evid. 201(b) in a termination-of-parental-rights trial. 289 N.W.2d 153, 157 (Minn. 1980). In that case, the father objected to the court taking judicial notice after the attorney for the welfare department advised the father's counsel of its intention to request that the court make these records part of the proceedings. Id. at 156. The court in Clausen stated:
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