State of Minnesota, Respondent,

This opinion is nonprecedential except as provided by
Minn. R. Civ. App. P. 136.01, subd. 1(c).

STATE OF MINNESOTA
IN COURT OF APPEALS
A24-0461

State of Minnesota,
Respondent,

vs.

Daniel Joseph Rice,
Appellant.

Filed February 10, 2025
Affirmed
Johnson, Judge

Ramsey County District Court
File No. 62-CR-20-7608

Keith Ellison, Attorney General, St. Paul, Minnesota; and

John J. Choi, Ramsey County Attorney, Anna R. Light, Assistant County Attorney, St.
Paul, Minnesota (for respondent)

Cathryn Middlebrook, Chief Appellate Public Defender, Roy G. Spurbeck, Assistant
Public Defender, St. Paul, Minnesota (for appellant)

Considered and decided by Bjorkman, Presiding Judge; Johnson , Judge; and
Klaphake, Judge.
∗

∗ Retired judge of the Minnesota Court of Appeals, serving by appointment pursuant
to Minn. Const. art. VI, § 10.
2
NONPRECEDENTIAL OPINION
JOHNSON, Judge
Daniel Joseph Rice was charged with two crimes in Ramsey County while he was
in prison for a prior conviction. Rice used a prison form to request a final disposition of
the charges pending in Ramsey County within six months , consistent with the Uniform
Mandatory Disposition of Detainers Act (the UMDDA). But prison officials failed to send
Rice’s request to the district court and the prosecutor. More than six months later, Rice
moved to dismiss the pending charges. The district court denied the motion. We conclude
that Rice is not entitled to dismissal of the charges because the applicable statute does not
specify a remedy if a prosecutor does not receive a defendant’s request for a final
disposition of pending charges. Therefore, we affirm.
FACTS
On December 9, 2020, the state charged Rice in Ramsey County with possession of
a firearm by an ineligible person and possession of ammunition by an ineligible person, in
violation of Minn. Stat. § 624.713, subd. 1(2) (2020). The state alleged in the complaint
that, approximately three months earlier, while Rice was on supervised release, he
possessed a loaded pistol in his home.
When the Ramsey County charges were filed, Rice was confined at the Minnesota
Correctional Facility in Faribault. On December 10, 2020, prison officials informed Rice
of the new charges in Ramsey County and of his right to request a final disposition of the
charges under the UMDDA. Prison officials provided Rice with a form that he could use
to make such a request. On December 11, 2020, Rice completed and signed the form and
3
returned it to the prison’s records office. On December 14, 2020, Rice’s form was uploaded
to an electronic records system so that it could be printed and mailed to the Ramsey County
District Court and the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office. But, for reasons that are not fully
described in the record, Rice’s form was inadvertently deleted or otherwise removed from
the electronic records system and, thus, was not mailed to the Ramsey County District
Court or the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office.
Approximately seven months later, on July 12, 2021, Rice—apparently unaware
that his final-disposition request had not been mailed to the district court or the county
attorney’s office—sent a letter to the district court administrator, requesting that the
pending charges be dismissed because they had not been resolved within six months of his
request. On August 22, 2021, Rice sent a second letter to the district court administrator
and filed a pro se motion to dismiss the charges pursuant to the UMDDA.
The district court administrator forwarded Rice’s second letter and his motion to the
county attorney’s office. The county attorney’s office informed the district court
administrator by letter that Rice’s motion was received by that office on August 25, 2021.
The letter states that Rice’s motion is based on a “previously unserved/unfiled request for
final disposition.” The letter writer requested that the district court administrator schedule
a first appearance within 30 days and a trial within six months of August 25, 202 1. In
October 2021, an assistant county attorney filed a memorandum in response to Rice’s
motion to dismiss, arguing that the motion should be denied because the county attorney’s
office did not receive Rice’s final-disposition request until August 25, 2021.
4
The district court conducted a hearing on Rice’s motion in January 2022. The
district court denied Rice’s motion from the bench on the ground that the UMDDA does
not provide a remedy if prison officials fail to send a prisoner’s final-disposition request to
the district court and the prosecuting attorney.
In November 2023, Rice and the state entered into a plea agreement in which Rice
agreed to plead guilty to the second charge and the state agreed to dismiss the first charge.
Before sentencing, Rice moved for reconsideration of the district court’s denial of his
motion to dismiss. At a sentencing hearing in December 2023, the district court denied
Rice’s motion for reconsideration on the grounds that the issue already had been resolved
and that the UMDDA does not provide a remedy in these circumstances. The district court
imposed a sentence of 60 months of imprisonment. Rice appeals.
DECISION
Rice argues that the district court erred by denying his motion to dismiss. He
contends that he is entitled to dismissal of the charges because he properly requested a final
disposition and the charges were not resolved within six months. He asserts that he “did
everything he could to demand disposition” yet “the UMDDA was not followed.”
A.
“The UMDDA is designed to provide a speedy trial for prisoners who face
additional criminal charges.” State v. Vonbehren, 777 N.W.2d 48, 50 (Minn. App. 2010),
rev. denied (Minn. Mar. 16, 2010). To that end, the UMDDA provides, “Any person who
is imprisoned in a penal or correctional institution or other facility in the Department of
Corrections of this state may request final disposition of any untried indictment or
5
complaint pending against the person in this state.” Minn. Stat. § 629.292, subd. 1(a)
(2020). The UMDDA also provides a means by which a prisoner may be made aware of a
pending indictment or complaint:
The commissioner of corrections or other official
designated by the commissioner having custody of prisoners
shall promptly inform each prisoner in writing of the source
and nature of any untried indictment or complaint against the
prisoner of which the commissioner of corrections or such
official had knowledge or notice and of the prisoner’s right to
make a request for final disposition thereof.

Id., subd. 1(b). If the commissioner or commissioner’s designee fails to inform a prisoner
of new charges within one year, the prisoner shall be entitled to “a final dismissal of the
indictment or complaint with prejudice.” Id., subd. 1(c).
In addition, the UMDDA provides that a prisoner’s request for a final disposition of
pending charges “shall be in writing addressed to the court in which the indictment or
complaint is pending and to the prosecuting attorney charged with the duty of prosecuting
it, and shall set forth the place of imprisonment.” Id., subd. 1(a). “The request shall be
delivered to the commissioner of corrections or other official designated by the
commissioner having custody of the prisoner . . . .” Id., subd. 2. Upon such delivery of a
prisoner’s request, the commissioner or the commissioner’s designee “shall forthwith . . .
send by registered or certified mail, return receipt requested, one copy of the request and
certificate to the court and one copy to the prosecuting attorney to whom it is addressed.”
Id., subd. 2, 2(b).
1

1Since the relevant events in this case, the legislature has amended this provision to
give the commissioner or commissioner’s designee the option of sending the prisoner’s
6
Furthermore, the UMDDA specifies what must happen after the commissioner or
the commissioner’s designee sends a prisoner’s request to the district court and the
prosecuting attorney: “Within six months after the receipt of the request and certificate by
the court and prosecuting attorney, . . . the indictment or information shall be brought to
trial,” unless the parties stipulate for a continuance or the district court grants a continuance
for good cause. Id., subd. 3 (emphasis added); see also State v. Letourneau, 6 N.W.3d 73,
78-79 (Minn. 2024) (affirming district court’s grant of continuance for good cause).
Lastly, the UMDDA provides for consequences in the event that the prisoner is not
brought to trial within six months: “If, after such a request, the indictment or information
is not brought to trial within that period, no court of this state shall any longer have
jurisdiction thereof, nor shall the untried indictment or information be of any further force
or effect, and the court shall dismiss it with prejudice.” Minn. Stat. § 629.292, subd. 3.
B.
Both Rice and the state have cited and discussed this court’s opinion in Resendiz v.
State, 832 N.W.2d 860 (Minn. App. 2013), rev. denied (Minn. Aug. 20, 2013). In that case,
after a prisoner requested final disposition of pending charges, prison officials mistakenly
mailed the prisoner’s request to the wrong prosecuting attorney. Id. at 861-62. As a result,
the attorney actually prosecuting the pending charges was unaware of the prisoner’s request
until after the six-month period expired. Id. at 862. After being convicted, Resendiz

request to the district court and the prosecuting attorney “by e-filing and e-serving the
paperwork.” See 2023 Minn. Laws. ch. 52, art. 11, § 27, at 1009 ; 2024 Minn. Laws.
ch. 123, art. 8, § 26, at 2321-22; see also Minn. Stat. § 629.292, subd. 2(2) (2024).
7
petitioned for postconviction relief and argued that his rights under the UMDDA had been
violated. Id. The postconviction court denied the petition. Id.
On appeal, t his court considered whether the UMDDA “provides a remedy” for a
prison official’s failure to send a prisoner’s final-disposition request to the prosecuting
attorney and “what consequences flow from failure to perform those duties.” Id. at 862,
863. We noted that the UMDDA “explicitly provides a remedy—dismissal of the
complaint—in only two circumstances”: if prison officials fail to inform a prisoner of
pending charges and the right to request final disposition or if “a prisoner is not brought to
trial within six months after the court and prosecuting authority receive the request.” Id.
at 865 (citing Minn. Stat. § 629.292, subds. 1(c), 3 (2012)). W e also noted that the
UMDDA “is silent regarding a remedy for failure of the prison official to comply with the
duty to send Resendiz’s disposition request to the district court and to the prosecuting
authority to whom the request was addressed.” Id. at 864. We cited caselaw stating that,
despite the unfairness to a prisoner whose final-disposition request was not communicated
due to the negligence of prison officials, it would be “a significantly worse result if ‘the
prosecution will be precluded before the prosecutor even knows it has been requested.’”
Id. at 866 (quoting State v. Burks, 631 N.W.2d 411, 413 (Minn. App. 2001) (applying
Interstate Agreement on Detainers Act) (quoting Fex v. Michigan, 507 U.S. 43, 50 (1993))).
Given the absence of a statutory remedy, we reasoned that “we cannot supply that which
the legislature has not,” id. at 867, and we added that “[t]he answer to [the] question lies
. . . with the legislature and not with our court,” id. at 867-68. We concluded that Resendiz
8
was not entitled to postconviction relief. Id. at 868. The Resendiz opinion governs this
appeal and justifies the district court’s decision to deny Rice’s motion to dismiss.
C.
Rice acknowledges the Resendiz opinion but contends that it is distinguishable for
two reasons.
First, Rice contends that the prison officials in this case completely failed to send
his final-disposition request to anyone, unlike the prison officials in Resendiz, who
partially complied with the UMDDA by sending the prisoner’s request to the district court
and to a prosecutor’s office, albeit the wrong prosecutor’s office. This difference between
the two cases is irrelevant in light of the plain language of the statute, which states that
pending charges must be brought to trial within six months after “the receipt” of the
prisoner’s request by both “the court and prosecuting attorney.” Minn. Stat. § 629.292,
subd. 3. A failure to send a prisoner’s request to one of the two intended recipients is as
much of a statutory violation as a failure to send the request to both intended recipients. In
either situation, there is no “receipt of the request . . . by the court and prosecuting
attorney,” which means that the obligation to bring a prisoner’s case to trial within six
months is not triggered. Id.
Second, Rice contends that he was prejudiced in this case because his 60- month
sentence will extend his release date, unlike the defendant in Resendiz, who was not
prejudiced because he received a concurrent sentence that was shorter than his pre-existing
sentence. Again, the statutory obligation to bring a prisoner’s pending charges to trial
within six months is triggered only by the receipt of a prisoner’s final-disposition request
9
by both the district court and the prosecuting attorney. Id. Nothing in the UMDDA
indicates that the operation of the statute depends on the length of the sentence that might
be imposed following a conviction on the pending charges.
We are mindful that, in Resendiz, this court reasoned that the facts of Resendiz were
distinguishable from the facts of People v. Trancoso, 776 P.2d 374 (Colo. 1989), for
reasons that correspond to Rice’s contentions. See Resendiz, 832 N.W.2d at 864-65. The
facts of Trancoso are somewhat similar to the facts of this case inasmuch as Trancoso sent
a final-disposition request to the prison superintendent but prison officials failed to sen d
the request to the trial court and the prosecuting attorney. See Trancoso, 776 P.2d at 376.
Nonetheless, we read the Resendiz opinion as having decided the appeal on the ground that
the UMDDA does not provide a remedy for the failure of prison officials to send a
prisoner’s request to the district court and the prosecuting attorney. See 832 N.W.2d at
862-65. The Resendiz court’s discussion about partial compliance and lack of prejudice
may have supplied additional reasons to deny postconviction relief, but those additional
reasons were not essential to the decision. See id. at 864-65. This court cannot distinguish
Resendiz for the reasons urged by Rice without contradicting the primary holding of
Resendiz.
D.
Rice last argues, in the alternative, that this court should reconsider the Resendiz
opinion and choose to “not follow” it.
We start with the fundamental principle of stare decisis and the fact that Resendiz
is a precedential opinion, which means that we are bound by it. See State v. Chauvin, 955
10
N.W.2d 684, 689 (Minn. App. 2021), rev. denied (Minn. Mar. 10, 2021); State v. Peter ,
825 N.W.2d 126, 129 (Minn. App. 2012), rev. denied (Minn. Feb. 27, 2013); State v.
M.L.A., 785 N.W.2d 763, 767 (Minn. App. 2010), rev. denied (Minn. Sept. 21, 2010).
Furthermore, “the doctrine of stare decisis has special force in the area of statutory
interpretation because the Legislature is free to alter what we have done.” Koehnen v.
Flagship Marine Co., 947 N.W.2d 448, 453 (Minn. 2020) (quotation omitted). If “‘a
judicial interpretation of a statute has remained undisturbed, it becomes part of the terms
of the statute itself.’” Else v. Auto-Owners Ins. Co., 980 N.W.2d 319, 329 (Minn. 2022)
(quoting Wynkoop v. Carpenter, 574 N.W.2d 422, 426 (Minn. 1998) (citing Roos v. City
of Mankato, 271 N.W. 582, 584 (Minn. 1937))). In Resendiz, we conspicuously stated,
“The answer to [the] question lies . . . with the legislature and not with our court.” 832
N.W.2d at 868. In the twelve years since Resendiz, the legisla ture has made two
amendments to the U MDDA to allow for electronic communications in lieu of registered
or certified mail, as mentioned above. See supra 5-6 n.1. But the legislature has not
amended the UMDDA to provide a remedy for the situation in which prison officials fail
to send a prisoner’s final-disposition request to both the district court and the prosecuting
attorney. The legislature’s inaction since Resendiz is an additional reason why this court
should adhere to Resendiz.
In urging this court to not apply Resendiz , Rice cites a subsequent supreme court
opinion for the general principle that, if the UMDDA is silent or ambiguous on a particular
issue, the statute should be interpreted according to its purpose. See State v. Mikell, 960
N.W.2d 230, 242 (Minn. 2021). The specific issue before the Mikell court was whether
11
the state violated the UMDDA by refiling charges that the state had voluntarily dismissed
after the prisoner had requested a final disposition. Id. at 239. Unsurprisingly, the Mikell
opinion does not cite the Resendiz opinion. Id. at 236-57. The issue in Mikell is not
sufficiently related to the issue in Resendiz to allow this court to conclude that Resendiz
was implicitly overruled by Mikell.
Lastly, we note that, in urging this court to not apply Resendiz, Rice cites two
opinions from other states: the Trancoso opinion from Colorado, which is mentioned
above, and State v. Taylor, 538 P.2d 310 (Utah 1975). Both Trancoso and Taylor were
issued before Resendiz, and the Trancoso opinion was thoroughly discussed in the Resendiz
opinion. See Resendiz, 832 N.W.2d at 864-65. Furthermore, our research reveals that, to
date, neither Trancoso nor Taylor has been cited by courts outside the states of Colorado
and Utah. Accordingly, we decline to reconsider whether this court should adopt the
reasoning in Trancoso and Taylor.
Thus, the district court did not err by denying Rice’s motion to dismiss.
Affirmed.