State v. Simon
The holding in the court’s own words
Bal-tasar does not apply in such a situation, and we hold that the district court erred in concluding that the prior conviction cannot be relied upon to convert a subsequent DWI offense by defendant into a gross misdemeanor under section 169.121, subd. 3. Reversed and remanded for trial.
Quoted verbatim from the opinion — no paraphrase, nothing generated. Not yet human-reviewed. How we find the holding.
Cited by
- State of Minnesota, Respondent, Minn. Ct. App. 2021
- State v. Schmidt 712 N.W.2d 530 Minn. 2006
- State v. Fussy 458 N.W.2d 428 Minn. Ct. App. 1990
- State v. Lang 432 N.W.2d 478 Minn. Ct. App. 1988
- State v. Warren 419 N.W.2d 795 Minn. 1988
- State v. Snyder 408 N.W.2d 708 Minn. Ct. App. 1987
- In Re the Welfare of T.S.E. 379 N.W.2d 99 Minn. Ct. App. 1985
Authorities cited
Identified automatically; this list may not be exhaustive.
- State v. Nordstrom 331 N.W.2d 901
- Shackelford v. State 312 Minn. 602
- State v. Motl 337 N.W.2d 664
Opinion text
AMDAHL, Chief Justice. In State v. Nordstrom, 331 N.W.2d 901 (Minn.1983), we held in part that a prior misdemeanor DWI conviction based on an uncounseled guilty plea cannot be used to convert a subsequent DWI offense into a gross misdemeanor under Minn.Stat. § 169.121, subd. 3 (1982), absent a valid waiver of counsel on the record of the prior proceeding. In Nordstrom there was no record and the guilty plea was uncoun-seled. 1 Our decision was based on Baldasar v. Illinois, 446 U.S. 222 , 100 S.Ct. 1585 , 64 L.Ed.2d 169 (1980), a case that forbade use of a prior uncounseled misdemeanor conviction, absent a valid waiver of counsel, to convert a subsequent misdemeanor conviction into a felony offense. In this case it is undisputed that the guilty plea was counseled, a fact that justifies the conclusion that counsel presumably advised defendant of his other rights. Henderson v. Morgan, 426 U.S. 637, 646 , 96 S.Ct. 2253, 2258 , 49 L.Ed.2d 108 (1976); Shackelford v. State, *908 312 Minn. 602 , 253 N.W.2d 149 (1977). Bal-tasar does not apply in such a situation, and we hold that the district court erred in concluding that the prior conviction cannot be relied upon to convert a subsequent DWI offense by defendant into a gross misdemeanor under section 169.121, subd. 3. Reversed and remanded for trial. 1 . Compare Nordstrom with State v. Motl, 337 N.W.2d 664 (Minn.1983), where we held that the record establishing the waiver of counsel in connection with the guilty plea to the prior misdemeanor was barely adequate.