State of Minnesota, 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This opinion will be unpublished and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
A17-0080

State of Minnesota,
Respondent

vs.

Maurice Curtis Brown,
Appellant.

Filed December 26, 2017
Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded
Rodenberg, Judge

Ramsey County District Court
File No. 62-CR-16-2756

Lori Swanson, Attorney General, St. Paul, Minnesota; and

John J. Choi, Ramsey County Attorney, Thom as R. Ragatz, Assist ant County Attorney,
St. Paul, Minnesota (for respondent)

Cathryn Middlebrook, Chief Appe llate Public Defender, Adam Lozeau, Assistant Public
Defender, St. Paul, Minnesota (for appellant)

Considered and decided by Worke, Presid ing Judge; Rodenberg, Judge; and Reilly,
Judge.
U N P U B L I S H E D O P I N I O N
RODENBERG, Judge
Appellant Maurice Curtis Brown challenges his convictions for stalking and threats
of violence, arguing that the district cour t plainly erred by admitting irrelevant and

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prejudicial evidence of his racial attitudes and his alleged status as a drug dealer, that the
district court erred by admitting two incidents of his past behavior as relationship evidence,
and that these errors cumulatively deprived him of a fair trial. Appellant further argues for
the vacation of one of his sentences because his threats-of-violence conviction arose from
the same behavioral incident as his stalking conviction. We affirm in part, reverse in part,
and remand.
FACTS
Appellant was charged with stalking by text message in violation of Minn. Stat.
§ 609.749, subd. 2(4) (2014), stal king with a purpose or intent to injure in violation of
Minn. Stat. § 609.749, subd. 2(1) (2014), and threats of violence in violation of Minn. Stat.
§ 609.713, subd. 1 (Supp. 2015). The incident leading to the charges involved appellant
sending the victim a string of 52 text message s in a period of approximately three and a
half hours on April 7, 2016. The message s became increasingly confrontational and
threatened violence. The vi ctim called law enforcement while she was receiving the
messages, and she told police that she believe d appellant would carry out his threats and
injure her. The stalking charges were enhan ced to felonies because appellant had five
qualifying domestic-violence-related convictions within the last ten years. Minn. Stat.
§ 609.749, subd. 4 (2014).
At trial, the state offered and the district court received in evidence the string of text
messages between appellant and the victim. The state did not redact from the text-message
string statements that reflected appellant’s racial attitudes, and an accusation by the victim
that appellant was a drug dealer. Appellant did not object or request redaction.

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The state also presented relationship evid ence at trial, two incidents of which
appellant challenges on appeal. First, the di strict court permitted the state to introduce a
2010 incident in which appellant threatened to “put a bullet” in th e victim’s head. The
district court admitted evid ence of the incident as domestic conduct under Minn. Stat.
§ 634.20 (2014). Next, the district court deni ed the state’s pretrial request to introduce
evidence of a 2014 incident in which appellant sent the victim multiple intimidating emails.
It determined that evidence of this incident was inadmissibl e under Minn. Stat. § 634.20.
Despite this pretrial ruling, the state asked the victim at trial about this incident. Appellant
did not object to this line of questioning, and the district court took no action on its own
accord to enforce its earlier pretrial ruling.
A jury found appe llant guilty of all three charges. The district court sentenced
appellant to 44 months in pr ison for stalking via text messa ge, and sentenced him to 29
months in prison for threats of violence. The district court entered a conviction for stalking
with the purpose or intent to injure but did not sentence appellant on the charge.
This appeal followed.
D E C I S I O N
Appellant first argues that the district court plainly erred by admitting irrelevant and
prejudicial evidence of his racial attitudes and his alleged status as a drug dealer when it
admitted the unredacted text messages at trial. Second, appellant argues that the district
court erred by admitting as relationship evidence his 2010 threat to harm the victim, erred
by not enforcing its pretrial prohibition concerning the 201 4 incident, and that, taken
together, these errors cumulatively undermined hi s right to a fair trial. Appellant further

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argues that, because his threat s-of-violence conviction aros e from the same behavioral
incident as his stalking convictions, his sentence for threats of violence should be vacated.
We first address whether the district court plainly erred by admitting unredacted text
messages containing statements regarding ap pellant’s racial attitudes and allegations
concerning his background as a drug dealer. At trial, the state o ffered into evidence,
without objection, a long string of text me ssages between appellant and the victim. The
string included statements regarding appellant’s racial attitudes and a text from the victim
saying that appellant sold drugs and would not stop.
Because appellant did not object, we apply the plain-error standard of review. State
v. Griller, 583 N.W.2d 736, 740 (Minn. 1998). “The plain error standard requires that the
defendant show: (1) error; (2) that was plain; and (3) that affected substantial rights.” State
v. Strommen, 648 N.W.2d 681, 686 (Minn. 2002). “With respect to the substantial-rights
requirement, [the defendant] bears the burden of establishing that there is a reasonable
likelihood that the absence of the error would have had a signi ficant effect on the jury’s
verdict.” State v. Horst , 880 N.W.2d 24, 38 (Minn. 2016 ). If all three elements of the
plain-error test are met, “we should address the error to ensure fairness and the integrity of
the judicial proceedings. . . . We will correct the e rror only if the fair ness, integrity, or
public reputation of the judicial pr oceeding is seriously affected.” State v. Dobbins, 725
N.W.2d 492, 508 (Minn. 2006) (quotations and citations omitted). Because the district
court was not given the opportunity to decide whether the text messages should have been
redacted, the issue we address on appeal is wh ether the district court should have ordered

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the state to redact the text messages sua sponte. State v. Vick, 632 N.W.2d 676, 685 (Minn.
2001).
A district court does not err by failing to sua sponte exclude evidence when a
defendant’s failure to object to the evidence may be part of his trial strategy. See State v.
Washington, 693 N.W.2d 195, 204-05 (M inn. 2005) (holding that a district court did not
err by failing to sua sponte strike testimony which appellant claimed exceeded the scope
of admissible Spreigl evidence when appellant drew attention to that particular testimony
himself). Here, the district court admitted as evidence, within a la rger string of text
messages, a small number of messages which c ontained statements reflecting appellant’s
racial attitudes and one text message in which the victim accused appellant of being a drug
dealer. Appellant did not object to the unreda cted text messages at trial. When the state
asked for clarification regard ing appellant’s motion in limin e to exclude trial testimony
from the victim regarding appellant’s drug use, and asked whether appellant wanted a text
message redaction for the refe rences to illegal drugs in ad dition to a limitation on the
victim’s testimony, appellant only requested th at the testimony not in clude references to
illegal drug use. He did not ask for redaction. Later, the district court clarified that it would
not order the state to redact the text message in which the victim claimed that appellant
was a drug dealer because it was a “passing reference” in a “lo ng message[,]” and the
district court did not want to draw the jury’s attention to it. Appellant did not object to or
otherwise follow up on this statement by the district court. Notably, appellant did ask that
a portion of a 911 transcript that was introd uced at trial be redacted for prejudicial
information, but did not ask that the text messages be redacted. From this record, it appears

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that appellant deliberately refrained from objec ting to the evidence he now challenges on
appeal.
Further, the record indicates that appellant himself drew the jury’s attention to issues
of race, and this appears to ha ve been a part of his defense strategy. Appellant’s counsel
questioned the victim on cross-examination re garding her use of a racial slur towards
appellant (to which the victim responded that “there were racial terms coming from both
sides”). In his closing argumen ts, appellant’s counsel again dr ew the jury’s attention to
race by stating that the victim had used a racial slur towards the appellant. Defense counsel
argued that the parties had large, emotional arguments in which the parties said “unpleasant
things” and things they “shouldn’t say” to each other. Appellant argued to the jury that,
because the parties had these sorts of arguments, it was unreasonable for the victim to feel
frightened by appellant’s string of text messages. Appellant’s decision not to ask that the
text messages be redacted for racial commen ts and the victim’s ac cusation that appellant
was a drug dealer seems to have been a tactical one to support his defense narrative at trial
that the parties had a toxic relationship and had a history of extreme arguments with one
another that almost always blew over.
Because appellant had ample opportunity to ask for redaction of the text messages
and because appellant himself drew the jury’s attention to issues of race, the district court
did not err by failing to sua sponte order the redaction of the text messages. There was no
plain error.
We next address the issue of whether th e district court im properly admitted as
relationship evidence two past incidents of appellant’s conduct toward the victim.

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Appellant first challenges the district court’s admission of evidence regarding an
incident that took place in 2010, during which appellant threatened to “put a bullet” through
the victim’s head, arguing that any potential relevance to wh ether appellant was guilty of
stalking and threatening the victim was gr eatly outweighed by the potential for unfair
prejudice. We review a district court’s admission of relationship evidence for an abuse of
discretion. State v. Bell, 719 N.W.2d 635, 641 (Minn. 20 06). “A defendant claiming the
district court erred in adm itting evidence bears th e burden of provin g the admission was
erroneous and prejudicial.” State v. Rhodes , 627 N.W.2d 74, 84 (Minn. 2001). “[A]n
appellant who alleges an erro r in the admission of evidence that does not implicate a
constitutional right must prove that there is a reasonable possibility that the wrongfully
admitted evidence significantly affected the verdict.” State v. Peltier , 874 N.W.2d 792,
802 (Minn. 2016).
Relationship evidence is admissible, where relevant, to “show a strained
relationship” between the parties. State v. Bauer , 598 N.W.2d 352, 36 5 (Minn. 1999).
Minn. Stat. § 634.20 (2016) provides for a subtype of relationship evidence, domestic
conduct evidence.
Evidence of domestic conduct by the accused against the
victim of domestic conduct . . . is admissible unless the
probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of
unfair prejudice, confusion of the issue, or misleading the jury,
or by considerations of undue delay, waste of time, or needless
presentation of cumulative evidence.

Minn. Stat. § 634.20. “[E]vi dence of prior [domestic] conduct between the accused and
the alleged victim” may “put the crime charged in the context of [their] relationship,” State

8
v. McCoy, 682 N.W.2d 153, 159 (Minn. 2004), and may bolster its probative value, State
v. Kennedy, 585 N.W.2d 385, 392 (Minn. 1998).
Before trial, the district court consid ered and applied Minn. Stat. § 634.20 to
determine whether the 2010 incident was admissible. The district court specifically stated
that one of the elements the state must prove is that appellant’s statements were made with
“the intent to terrorize [the victim] or in reckless disregard of ca using such terror” and
decided to admit the incident as a “face-to-face threat of violen ce” in order to “put[] into
context” why the victim may have been frightened by appellant’s threats. The district court
admitted the 2010 incident, but also stated it would include a jury instruction explaining to
the jury the limits and proper purpose of the evidence.
The district court properly considered and applied Minn. Stat. § 634.20 when
deciding whether to ad mit the 2010 incident as relati onship evidence. This evidence
provided context as to the relationship between appellant and the victim as it demonstrated
the ongoing conflicts between them. In addition, the district court took care to instruct the
jury regarding how to properly use relationship evidence. A limiting instruction “lessens
the probability of undue weight being given by the jury to [relationship] evidence.” State
v. Ware, 856 N.W.2d 719, 729 (Minn. App. 2014). We presume that a jury follows the
district court’s instructions. State v. Miller, 573 N.W.2d 661, 675 (Minn. 1998). Because
the 2010 incident provided context to the re lationship between appellant and the victim,
and the court properly applied Minn. Stat. § 634.20 when considering whether to admit it
as evidence in additio n to giving the jury a limiting instruction, th e district court acted
within its discretion when admitting this piece of relationship evidence.

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Appellant also argues the district court e rred by failing to sua sponte preclude trial
testimony from the victim regarding a 2014 incident which it had deemed inadmissible in
a pretrial ruling. The district court determ ined pretrial that the testimony regarding
multiple 2014 intimidating emails would be cumulative and would create confusion for the
jury. Despite this, the state asked the victim during trial about the 2014 emails and the
victim described the incident. There was no objection, nor did the district court intercede
sua sponte. Because appellant failed to object to the testimony at trial, we apply the plain-
error test, as set forth above. Griller, 583 N.W.2d at 740.
Appellant fails to demonstrate that the pl ain error, if any there was, affected his
substantial rights. Appellant does not assert that it was prosecutorial misconduct for the
state to not adhere to a pretrial ruling of the district court. Appellant only argues on appeal
that the district court should have enforced its own ruling sua sponte.
In order to satisfy the third element of the plain-error test, appellant “bears the
burden of establishing that ther e is a reasonable likelihood th at the absence of the error
would have had a significant effect on the jury’s verdict.” Horst, 880 N.W.2d at 88
(quotations omitted). Here, even if we were to determine that the district court plainly
erred by failing to enforce its pretrial ru ling to exclude evidence regarding the 2014
incident, appellant fails to sh ow that his substantial right s were affected. The state
presented an immense amount of evidence s howing the extent of the violent threats
appellant made to the victim over the course of 52 text messages, including a threat to cut
off her head and leave it on her father’s doors tep. Additionally, the jury was presented
with evidence that, in 2009, appellant punched the vi ctim in the face while she was

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pregnant. This evidence, clearly showing the threats appellant made as well as his ability
to carry out those threats, would have been su fficient to convict appellant of the stalking
and threats-of-violence offenses without taking the 2014 incident into consideration. The
evidence regarding appellant’s 20 14 emails to the victim we re a small piece of a much
larger case presented by the state. Moreove r, the district court instructed the jury
concerning how it should utilize relationship ev idence presented during the trial. These
instructions would have been applicable to the 2014 incident as well as the other incidents
presented as relationship evidence at trial. There is no indication in the record that the
2014 incident had any significant effect on the jury’s verdict.1
Appellant further argues that the district court’s cumulative e rrors undermined his
right to a fair trial. “Cumulative error exists when the cumulative effect of the errors and
indiscretions, none of which alone might have been enough to tip the scales, operate to the
defendant’s prejudice by producing a biased jury.” State v. Penkaty, 708 N.W.2d 185, 200

1 Even if we analyzed the potential prosecutorial-misconduct issue arguably occasioned by
the state having elicited evidence barred by th e district court’s pretrial ruling concerning
the 2014 emails, we would still conclude that the error, if any, did not affect appellant’s
substantial rights. We may, in some cases, a ddress issues not raised by the parties where
it is necessary to do so to discharge our responsibility as an appellate court. See State v.
Hannuksela, 452 N.W.2d 668, 673 (M inn. 1990) (addressing issues of “severance” and
“partial invalidity” in the cont ext of an evidence-suppression issue, where the parties did
not address those issues either in briefing or at oral argument). In context, the state would
bear the burden of showing that any prosecut orial misconduct did not affect appellant’s
substantial rights. See State v. Ramey, 721 N.W.2d 294, 302 (Minn. 2006) (setting forth a
“new approach of shifting the burden to the prosecution to show lack of prejudice in
prosecutorial misconduct cases” for policy reasons). In context, and even if we examined
the plain-error question with the burden shifted to the state, we would conclude that the
state of the record definitively demonstrates the absence of a significant effect on the jury’s
verdict, regardless of the burden.

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(Minn. 2006) (quotation omitted). At most, and even if we were to hold that the district
court plainly erred by failing to enforce its pret rial ruling sua sponte, that single error,
which did not significantly affect the verdict, cannot support appellant’s cumulative-error
argument.
Finally, appellant argues that one of hi s sentences should be vacated because his
threats of violence and stalking convictions ar ose out of the same behavioral incident.
Minn. Stat. § 609.035 (2014) prevents the imposition of multiple sentences for crimes
committed during the same behavioral incident and “contemplates that a defendant will be
punished for the most serious of the offenses arising out of a single be havioral incident.”
State v. Kebaso , 713 N.W.2d 317, 322 (Minn. 2006) (quotation omitted). “When
conducting a single-behavioral-incident analys is for two intentional crimes, Minnesota
courts consider whether the conduct (1) shar es a unity of time and place and (2) was
motivated by an effort to obtain a single criminal objective.” State v. Bauer, 776 N.W.2d
462, 478 (Minn. App. 2009) (citing State v. Williams, 608 N.W.2d 837, 841 (Minn. 2000)),
aff’d, 792 N.W.2d 825 (Minn. 2011).
The conduct underlying both offenses here is appellant’s sending of text messages
to the victim on April 7. This satisfies the requirement that the conduct must share a unity
of time and place.
We next consider whether appellant’s conduct was motivated by an effort to “obtain
a single criminal objective.” Bauer, 776 N.W.2d at 478. Stalking under Minn. Stat.
§ 609.749, subd. 1, is conduct “which the actor knows or has reason to know would cause
the victim under the circumstances to feel frightened, threatened, oppressed, persecuted, or

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intimidated.” Threats of violence under Minn. Stat. § 609.713, subd. 1, requires proof of
a “purpose to terrorize another.” Appellant’s behavior satisfies the intent elements of both
crimes because it appears to have been guided by a single objective of frightening the
victim. Because both requirements of the single-behavioral-incident analysis are satisfied,
we reverse the sentences and remand for the district court to determine which of the
sentences is for the least serious offense, vacate that sentence, and resentence appellant on
the more serious offense. See State v. Jones, 848 N.W.2d 528, 538 (Minn. 2014) (reversing
and remanding to the district court with instructions to v acate a sentence when appellant
was sentenced for two crimes occurring out of the same behavioral incident).
The district court did not err by not sua sponte ordering the redaction of text
messages presented as evidence at trial a nd did not abuse its di scretion by admitting as
relationship evidence the 2010 incident betw een appellant and the victim. Further, the
admission of evidence at trial that the district court had ea rlier ruled inadmissible had no
significant effect on the jury’s verdict. We affirm appellant’s convictions. Because
appellant’s sentences for threats of violence and stalking arose out of the same behavioral
incident, we reverse and remand for the district court to vacate the sentence for the less
serious offense and resentence appellant only on the more serious offense.
Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded.