Peterson v. State

1

Zachariah Joel Peterson, petitioner, Appellant, v. State of Minnesota, Respondent.

No. A23-0226

Court of Appeals of Minnesota

October 24, 2023

Anoka County District Court File No. 02-K9-06-001984

Considered and decided by Wheelock, Presiding Judge; Larkin Judge; and Halbrooks, Judge. ^[*]

ORDER OPINION

SARAH I. WHEELOCK, JUDGE

BASED ON THE FILE, RECORD, AND PROCEEDINGS, AND BECAUSE:

1. Appellant Zachariah Joel Peterson challenges the district court's denial of his postconviction petition seeking to withdraw his guilty plea to aiding and abetting second-degree assault with a firearm. Peterson argues that the district court abused its discretion by denying his petition as untimely because he meets the interests-of-justice exception to the two-year statutory time bar. Because we conclude that Peterson has not met the interests-of-justice exception to the two-year time bar, we affirm.

2. On May 26, 2006, Peterson pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting second-degree assault with a firearm in violation of Minn Stat. §§ 609.05, subd. 2, .222, subd. 1, .11, subd 5 (2004).

On the same day, the district court sentenced Peterson to 36 months in prison. Peterson did not file a direct appeal.

3. After serving his sentence in Minnesota, Peterson traveled to Missouri. In 2011, he was charged in Missouri with second-degree murder. In 2012, that case proceeded to trial. Before trial, Peterson received records related to his prior conviction in Minnesota. The records showed that Peterson had pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting second-degree assault with a firearm.

4. On May 31, 2022, Peterson filed a pro se postconviction petition seeking to withdraw his guilty plea. In an accompanying memorandum, Peterson argued that his guilty plea was unintelligent and invalid because he did not know about the firearm element of the crime to which he pleaded guilty. Peterson argued that, because he did not know about the firearm element of the crime, he never formally pleaded guilty to and was never actually convicted of the offense. He also asserted that his attorney was not present during his plea hearing and that his conviction was therefore void. Finally, Peterson argued that the two-year time limit for filing a postconviction petition did not apply because his case presented "a rare and extraordinary circumstance."

5. The Office of the Minnesota Appellate Public Defender (OMAPD) was subsequently appointed to represent Peterson. In a letter filed as a supplement to Peterson's postconviction petition, an attorney with OMAPD asked the district court to grant Peterson's petition "in the interests of fairness and justice." In support of this request, the letter noted that OMAPD had received a copy of the complaint, plea petition, and sentencing order in Peterson's case, but that the rest of the record and transcripts had been destroyed pursuant to the district court's record-retention policy. The letter asked the district court to consider Hoagland v. State, a case in which the Minnesota Supreme Court held that a defendant who did not have access to a transcript of his trial might be entitled to a new trial, even though he filed his postconviction petition eight years after entry of his conviction, because court employees had failed to preserve the transcript. 518 N.W.2d 531, 535-36 (Minn. 1994). The letter also noted that there had been no appellate review of Peterson's conviction and that "convicted defendants are generally entitled to at least one right of review." Stutelberg v. State, 741 N.W.2d 867, 874 (Minn. 2007) (quotation omitted).

6. The district court denied Peterson's petition for postconviction relief. In its order, the district court concluded that the record did not support Peterson's assertions that he did not plead guilty to aiding and abetting second-degree assault with a firearm and that his attorney was not present during the plea hearing. The district court also distinguished Peterson's case from Hoagland, explaining that court personnel had improperly destroyed the trial records in that case, whereas the records in Peterson's case were properly disposed of according to the record-retention policy of the Minnesota Judicial Branch. The district court also noted that if Peterson had filed his petition when he became aware of the firearm element of the conviction, "the transcript and court reporter notes would still have been available for review." Finally, the district court denied Peterson's petition as untimely because it was not filed within two years after the entry of judgment of conviction or sentence and concluded that no exception to the two-year statutory time limit applied. See Minn. Stat. § 590.01, subd. 4 (2022).

7. On appeal, Peterson challenges the district court's denial of his postconviction petition. We review the district court's denial of a petition for postconviction relief for an abuse of discretion. Campbell v. State, 916 N.W.2d 502, 506 (Minn. 2018). In determining whether a district court abused its discretion, we review the district court's factual findings for clear error and its legal conclusions de novo. Eason v. State, 950 N.W.2d 258, 263-64 (Minn. 2020).

8. A person convicted of a crime may bring a postconviction petition seeking to vacate and set aside a judgment based on a claim that the conviction violated their constitutional rights or their rights under federal or state law. Minn. Stat. § 590.01, subd. 1 (2022). Generally, no petition for postconviction relief may be filed more than two years after the entry of judgment of conviction or an appellate court's disposition of a petitioner's direct appeal. Id., subd. 4(a). But even if more than two years have elapsed, a postconviction court may still consider a petition for postconviction relief if the petitioner establishes "that the petition is not frivolous and is in the interests of justice." Id., subd. 4(b)(5). This exception is "triggered by an injustice that caused the petitioner to miss the primary deadline in subdivision 4(a) and not the substantive claims in the petition." Caldwell v. State, 976 N.W.2d 131, 141 (Minn. 2022) (emphasis omitted) (quotation omitted).

9. To establish that an untimely petition should still be considered in...