Mackenzie Hanson, petitioner, Respondent,

This opinion will be unpublished and
may not be cited except as provided by
Minn. Stat. § 480A.08, subd. 3 (2016).

STATE OF MINNESOTA
IN COURT OF APPEALS
A16-2069

Mackenzie Hanson, petitioner,
Respondent,

vs.

Austin Alexander Burridge,
Appellant.

Filed August 7, 2017
Affirmed
Connolly, Judge

Dakota County District Court
File No. 19AV-CV-16-3039

Mackenzie Hanson, Rosemount, Minnesota (pro se respondent)

Joseph P. Tamburino, Hillary B. Parsons, Caplan & Tamburino Law Firm, P.A.,
Minneapolis, Minnesota (for appellant)

Considered and decided by Smith, Tracy M., Presiding Judge; Connolly, Judge; and
Smith, John, Judge.*

* Retired judge of the Minnesota Court of Appeals, serving by appo intment pursuant to
Minn. Const. art. VI, § 10.
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U N P U B L I S H E D O P I N I O N
CONNOLLY, Judge
Appellant challenges the harassment restraining order granted to respondent,
arguing that the district court abused its discretion in issuing the order. Because we see no
abuse of discretion, we affirm.
FACTS
Respondent Mackenzie Hanson and appellant Austin Burridge were both university
students living in the same dormitory. Respondent filed a petition for a harassment
restraining order against appellant. At the hearing on the petition, she testified that, on the
night of October 29-30, 2016, she fell asleep lying next to appellant on a futon in his dorm
room. She testified further:
I woke up on my back and . . . my clothes were on but my legs
were apart and we were bot h under one of the blankets . . .
[Appellant] had his knee over one of my knees . . . and he had
. . . one of his hands between my legs and then was touching
me, sexually. And at one point, he was . . . moving his hips
into my thigh. And, I don’t know after how long, I moved onto
my side, hoping he’d leave me alone. And he wrapped his arm
around my waist and, at that point, I got up and I left the room.

The district court asked respondent if appellant penetrated her vagina with his hand
or fingers; she answered, “No, he didn’t penetrate . . . but he was trying to move my clothes
and his fingers were in between my legs, on top of my clothes.” The district court asked,
“Are you sure that he [] touched you over your clothing between your legs?” and
respondent answered, “Yes.” The district court asked respondent to describe what she
meant by touching, and she answered, “Since my legs were apart, he had his hand in
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between my legs but my shorts were on and he was . . . rubbing his fingers back and forth
over my genitals.” When the district court asked respondent how long this went on, she
said she was not sure, because she had been asleep and “woke up to it . . . the parts that I
remember, maybe, like, five minutes.” The district court asked respondent why she had
not reacted to appellant’s touching for five minutes, and she said she was “too scared to
[react] and . . . half asleep.”
The district court found that:

[Appellant and respondent] wer e next to each other with two
others on the futon. [Respondent] fell asleep next to
[appellant.] I find that . . . she was awakened because
[appellant] had his hands on her vagina area, that he touched
her for several minutes, that his touching her was f or the
purpose of sexually assaulting her or to gain some type of
sexual gratification. I find that there was no consent by
[respondent] to be touched.
I’m not persuaded that [respondent] did not write
everything verbatim in the petition as to what happened. I have
no indication that [she] would make up such a story. . . .
. . . .
[B]ased on the testimony that I’ve heard, I’m convinced
that . . . [respondent] has proven that she was sexually assaulted
by [appellant]. Therefore, I am issuing a harassm ent
restraining order. This order will be in effect for a period of
two years.

The district court told appellant that he would have to move out of the dormitory in which
he and respondent had been living.
Appellant challenges the harassment restraining order, arguing that it was an abuse
of the district court’s discretion.
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D E C I S I O N
A district court’s findings of fact, whether based on oral or documentary evidence,
shall not be set aside unless they are clearly erroneous. Minn. R. Civ. P. 52.01. A district
court may issue a harassment restraining order “if [it] finds at the hearing that there are
reasonable grounds to believe that the [accused] has engaged in harassment.” Minn. Stat.
§ 609.748, subd. 5(a)(3) (2016). This court reviews the district court’s grant of a
harassment restraining order under an abuse -of-discretion standard. Witchell v. Witchell,
606 N.W.2d 730, 731 (Minn. App. 2000).
Appellant argues first that the district court abused its discretion by not requiring
respondent to prove that appellant touched her with sexual intent. But , in the context of
sexual assa ult, “a showing of sexual intent does not require direct evidence of the
defendant’s desires or gratification because a subjective sexual intent typically must be
inferred from the nature of the conduct itself.” State v. Austin, 788 N.W.2d 788, 792 (Minn.
App. 2010), review denied (Minn. Dec. 14, 2010).1 Appellant does not indicate what proof
respondent could have provided other than her testimony at the hearing and he does not
cite any case in which a victim of sexual harassment was required to prove that harassment
occurred by providing more than testimony.

1 However, while no direct evidence of sexual intent is required, direct evidence that the
defendant intended intimate contact to occur is required to establish sexual contact. Id.
The district court’s questions to respondent about what she meant by “touching” and how
long the touching continued before she responded to it established that appellant intended
his intimate contact of respondent to occur.
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Appellant also argues that the district court erroneously shifted the burden of proof
to appellant by asking him, “Why would [respondent] tell such a story if it’s not true?”
Appellant answered the question by saying, “I’m not the one to know the answer for that.”
But the district court was giving appellant an opportunity to explain any motive respondent
might have had to fabricate the story, not shifting to appellant the burden of proof. The
district court found “no indication that [respondent] would make up such a story.” A
district court’s findings of fact, whether based on oral or documentary evidence, shall not
be set aside unless they are clearly erroneous. Minn. R. Civ. P. 52.01.
Finally, appellant argues that the district court failed to consider the facts that the
state did not criminally charge him and the university did not suspend or expel him. But
whether appellant was guilty “beyond a reasonable doubt” of breaking the law or of
violating university regulations was not the issue here: the issue was whether there were
“reasonable grounds to believe that [he had] engaged in harassment” of respondent. See
Minn. Stat. § 609.748, subd. 5(a)(3). The purpose of the restraining order was to protect
respondent, not to punish appellant. Thus, the fact that neither the judicial system nor the
university took any action against appellant was not relevant, and the district court did not
abuse its discretion by not considering that fact.
Affirmed.