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This opinion is nonprecedential except as provided by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
A24-0628

State of Minnesota,
Respondent,

vs.

Patricia Michelle Jones,
Appellant.

Filed February 18, 2025
Reversed and remanded
Smith, Tracy M., Judge

Cottonwood County District Court
File No. 17-CR-23-101

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

Deja Weber, Cottonwood County Attorney, Windom, Minnesota; and

Travis J. Smith, Special Assistant County Attorney, Slayton, Minnesota (for respondent)

Cathryn Middlebrook, Chief Appellate Public Defender, Benjamin J. Butler, Assistant
Public Defender, St. Paul, Minnesota (for appellant)

Considered and decided by Smith, Tracy M., Presiding Judge; Frisch, Chief Judge;
and Kirk, Judge.
∗

∗ Retired judge of the Minnesota Court of Appeals, serving by appointment pursuant to
Minn. Const. art. VI, § 10.
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NONPRECEDENTIAL OPINION
SMITH, TRACY M., Judge
In this direct appeal from a judgment of conviction for malicious punishment of a
child, appellant Patricia Michelle Jones argues that the district court committed reversible
error by (1) admitting as evidence a hearsay statement that the child made to his father,
accusing Jones of abuse; (2) prohibiting Jones from introducing evidence of certain acts of
domestic abuse allegedly committed by an alternative perpetrator; and (3) admitting
recordings that allegedly capture Jones yelling at the child. Respondent State of Minnesota
concedes that the district court committed reversible error by admitting the child’s hearsay
statement without making the reliability findings required by Minnesota Statutes section
595.02, subdivision 3 (2024). We, too, agree that the district court erred by admitting the
child’s hearsay statement and that this error requires reversal of Jones’s conviction and
remand for a new trial. We do not reach Jones’s other assignments of error.
FACTS
Jones served as a foster parent to the child and his sister. The children lived with
Jones at her apartment, and no other individuals resided at that apartment. The child was
three years old at the time of the alleged abuse and four years old at the time of trial.
The child’s father occasionally had unsupervised visits with the child. According to
the father’s testimony at trial, on January 6, 2023, he helped the child use the bathroom
during an unsupervised visit. While doing so, he noticed bruising on the child’s buttocks.
The father additionally testified that, when he asked the child about the bruising, the child
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stated that “[Jones] had spanked him with a stick.” The father reported the child’s statement
to a caseworker and, along with the child, met with an investigator.
The state charged Jones with malicious punishment of a child under four years old
under Minnesota Statutes section 609.377, subdivisions 1 and 4 (2022). Prior to trial, Jones
moved the district court to allow her to present evidence of unrelated acts of domestic abuse
allegedly committed by the child’s father to support her theory that the child’s father
perpetrated the abuse of which she was accused. The district court denied Jones’s motion
with respect to the majority of the father’s other alleged acts. Jones additionally moved to
exclude as evidence audio recordings that allegedly capture her yelling at the child and his
sister. The district court denied Jones’s motion and allowed the state to play these
recordings at trial.
Shortly before the jury trial, the district court found the then four- year-old child
incompetent to testify at trial. The state then moved the district court under Minnesota
Statutes section 595.02, subdivision 3, to allow evidence of the hearsay statement that the
child allegedly made to his father accusing Jones of spanking him. The district court
granted the state’s motion over Jones’s objection. The state presented evidence of the
hearsay statement at trial through the father ’s testimony. Following the jury’s guilty
verdict, the district court convicted Jones, stayed imposition of the presumptive prison
sentence of 12 months and 1 day, and ordered that Jones spend 60 days in jail. See Minn.
Sent’g Guidelines 4.A, 5.A (2022).
This appeal follows.
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DECISION
Jones argues, and the state concedes, that the district court committed reversible
error by admitting the child’s hearsay statement. We agree.
Appellate courts review a district court’s evidentiary rulings, including a decision
to admit a hearsay statement under section 595.02, subdivision 3, for an abuse of discretion.
State v. Sime, 669 N.W.2d 922, 927 (Minn. App. 2003). “A district court abuses its
discretion if it misapplies the law, makes findings unsupported by the record, or resolves
discretionary questions in a manner that is contrary to logic and the facts on record.” State
v. Johnson, 979 N.W.2d 483, 502 (Minn. App. 2022), aff’d, 995 N.W.2d 155 (Minn. 2023).
Appellate courts will reverse a verdict when there is a “reasonable possibility that the
wrongfully admitted evidence significantly affected the verdict.” State v. Jaros, 932
N.W.2d 466, 472 (Minn. 2019) (quotation omitted).
The child’s out-of-court statement would ordinarily be excluded pursuant to the rule
against hearsay. See Minn. R. Evid. 801, 802. However, Minnesota Statutes section 595.02,
subdivision 3, under which the district court admitted this statement, allows for certain out-
of-court statements made by young children regarding physical abuse to be admitted as
substantive evidence. This section provides, in pertinent part:
An out-of-court statement made by a child under the age of ten
years . . . alleging, explaining, denying, or describing . . . any
act of physical abuse of the child . . . , not otherwise admissible
by statute or rule of evidence, is admissible as substantive
evidence if:
(a) the court or person authorized to receive evidence
finds, in a hearing conducted outside of the presence of the
jury, that the time, content, and circumstances of the statement
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and the reliability of the person to whom the statement is made
provide sufficient indicia of reliability; and
(b) the child . . .
(ii) is unavailable as a witness and there is
corroborative evidence of the act[.]

Minn. Stat. § 595.02, subd. 3 (emphases added). The district court recited most of these
requirements before granting the state’s motion to introduce the child’s statement.
In granting the state’s motion to introduce the child’s hearsay statement, the district
court reasoned:
In regard to the statement to the father, there is a clear
understanding and notice to the defense of what that statement
of the child is. Although the defense is going to argue that the
father has a motive and is an alternate perpetrator . . . , that has
not been a determination that’s been made by anyone at this
time. The Court will allow that substantive statement to be
discussed or—by the father as far as what the—that one
sentence that the child said to him about how he received the
bruises. Certainly, he is subject to cross-examination and
questioning . . . by the defense as to motive for that or his
reliability . . . .

So, the Court finds that the witness is unavailable as
identified by the statute. The witness—or the child is under 10
. . . . In regard to the statement to the father, the Court will
allow that, and that will be permitted to be introduced as
substantive evidence.
[1]

A. Admitting the Statement Without the Required Findings
We agree with the parties that the district court erred by admitting the statement
without making the reliability findings required by statute. The district court made no

1 The state additionally moved to introduce a similar statement that the child allegedly
made to his mother. The district court denied the state’s motion with respect to this second
statement due to a lack of notice about the contents and context of the statement.
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findings addressing (1) the time, content, and circumstances of the statement or (2) the
reliability of the person to whom the statement was made. See id., subd. 3(a).
As to the first factor, in Sime—a case that also addressed the admissibility of an out-
of-court statement under section 595.02, subdivision 3—we held that “the district court’s
ruling on the admissibility of the statements was premature without the testimony of the
witnesses as to the context and circumstances of [the child’s] statements.” 669 N.W.2d at
927-28. We explained that such testimony allows a district court to consider factors
including “the manner in which [the child] was questioned, whether leading questions were
utilized to elicit [the child’s] statements, whether there was consistent repetition of the
events, [the child’s] manner and emotional state when making the statements, and the
degree of certainty with which [the] statement was made.” Id. at 928. Here, although the
district court asked the state about the circumstances of the statement and noted that there
is information about the contents of the statement, it failed to find that the broader context
of the statement shows sufficient indicators of reliability.
As to the second factor, the district court failed to consider whether there is
information that supports the reliability of the child’s father—the person to whom the
statement was made. On this point, the district court’s statement that the child’s father has
not been determined to be an alternative perpetrator falls short of finding sufficient
indicators of his reliability.
Both parties also agree that the district court failed to consider whether there was
“corroborative evidence of the act.” Minn. Stat. § 595.02, subd. 3(b)(ii). Although the state
concedes that the district court committed reversible error in admitting the statement, it
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maintains that the record does contain corroborative evidence of the act because the child
was bruised and Jones had an opportunity to commit the crime. We need not further address
the question of corroborative evidence because the district court erred by not making all
the necessary findings under subdivision 3(a).
Nor was the hearsay statement clearly admissible under the statute. See State v.
Carver, 380 N.W.2d 821, 826 (Minn. App. 1986) (stating that a district court’s failure to
make the findings required by section 595.02, subdivision 3(a), was not reversible error
because the admitted hearsay statement was “ clearly admissible under the statute”), rev.
denied (Minn. Mar. 27, 1986). We note that, at trial, a police officer testified that the
victim’s father reported the child’s statement to her, a fact that might slightly bolster the
credibility of the father’s accusation. But this testimony does not add reliability to the
context in which the child, the hearsay declarant, made the initial statement. Moreover, at
the pretrial hearing, no witness testified about the context or circumstances of the child’s
statement or about the father’s reliability. The scant record that was produced at the hearing
does not provide a basis to determine that the hearsay evidence was clearly admissible.
B. Prejudicial Effect
We next consider whether there is a “reasonable possibility” that this evidence
“significantly affected the verdict.” Jaros, 932 N.W.2d at 472 (quotation omitted). Because
the child’s hearsay statement expressly linked Jones to the abuse at a time in which another
person had unsupervised visitation with the child, we conclude that there is a reasonable
possibility that this statement significantly affected the verdict.
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We therefore reverse Jones’s conviction and remand for a new trial. Because the
admission of the hearsay statement alone establishes a basis for reversal, we do not address
Jones’s arguments that the district court erred by excluding evidence of domestic violence
by an alleged alternative perpetrator and by admitting certain recordings.
Reversed and remanded.