Opinion
A20-0108
03-09-2021
State of Minnesota, Respondent, v. Laurssia Keyair Likness, Appellant.
ORDER OPINION
Isanti County District Court
File No. 30-CR-16-214 Considered and decided by Connolly, Presiding Judge; Reyes, Judge; and Halbrooks, Judge.
Retired judge of the Minnesota Court of Appeals, serving by appointment pursuant to Minn. Const. art. VI, § 10.
BASED ON THE FILE, RECORD, AND PROCEEDINGS, AND BECAUSE:
1. Respondent State of Minnesota charged appellant Laurssia Likness with wrongfully obtaining public assistance at various times between August 1, 2012, and February 28, 2015, in violation of Minn. Stat. § 256.98, subd. 1(1) (2014). Following a jury trial, Likness was found guilty of the charged offense. The district court then adjudicated Likness guilty, but stayed imposition of sentence and placed her on probation for ten years. This appeal follows.
2. Likness argues that her conviction must be reversed because the state failed to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that she acted with the specific intent to defeat the purposes of all of the public-assistance programs listed under Minn. Stat. § 256.98, subd. 1 (2014). Likness's sufficiency-of-the-evidence argument requires us to address the interpretation of the statute. See State v. Vasko, 889 N.W.2d 551, 556 (Minn. 2017) (deciding the appellant's statutory-interpretation question in order to analyze the sufficiency of the evidence). Statutory interpretation is a question of law that we review de novo. See State v. Prigge, 907 N.W.2d 635, 638 (Minn. 2018).
3. Section 256.98, subdivision 1, provides in relevant part as follows:
A person who commits any of the following acts or omissions with intent to defeat the purposes of sections 145.891 to 145.897, the MFIP program formerly codified in sections 256.031 to 256.0361, the AFDC program formerly codified in sections 256.72 to 256.871, chapters 256B, 256D, 256J, 256K, or 256L, and child care assistance programs, is guilty of theft and shall be sentenced under section 609.52, subdivision 3, clauses (1) to (5):Minn. Stat. § 256.98, subd. 1.
(1) obtains or attempts to obtain, or aids or abets any person to obtain by means of a willfully false statement or representation, by intentional concealment of any material fact, or by impersonation or other fraudulent device, assistance or the continued receipt of assistance, to include child care assistance or vouchers produced according to sections 145.891 to 145.897 and MinnesotaCare services according to sections 256.9365, 256.94, and 256L.01 to 256L.15, to which the person is not entitled or assistance greater than that to which the person is entitled[.]
4. Likness argues that the only reasonable interpretation of the statute is that the state had to prove that she had the intent to defeat the purposes of all of the public-assistance programs listed—even those that did not apply to her. To support her position, Likness points out that, based upon the plain language of the statute: (1) the public- assistance statutes listed are joined by the conjunction "and" rather than the disjunctive "or"; and (2) the statute refers to "purposes" in the plural rather than the singular.
5. The same argument made by Likness was recently rejected by this court in State v. Irby, ___ N.W.2d ___ (Minn. App. Mar. 8, 2021). In that case, this court determined that "[r]eading the statutory public-assistance programs as a conjunctive list would produce an absurd result" because, under such a reading, even if a recipient of an assistance program "wrongfully received benefits under one statutory program and did so with the intent to defeat the purpose of that program, the recipient would have to have obtained those benefits with the intent to defeat the various purposes of all of the other listed benefits programs." Irby, slip op. at 10; see also Schatz v. Interfaith Care Ctr., 811 N.W.2d 643, 651 (Minn. 2012) (stating that when the plain language of a statute "utterly confounds the clear legislative purpose of the statute," the statute must be interpreted to avoid such a result (quotation omitted)). This court also stated that the statute's use of the plural "purposes" does not change the result because, in State v. Ibarra, the 1982 version of section 256.98, under which Ibarra was convicted, used the plural "purposes," yet the supreme court determined that the evidence was sufficient to convict Ibarra of wrongfully obtaining public assistance based only on her receipt of benefits from one public-assistance program. Id., slip op. at 12 (citing State v. Ibarra, 355 N.W.2d 125, 130 (Minn. 1984)). This court concluded that "[b]ecause Irby's sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge rests on his misinterpretation of [section 256.98, subdivision 1], we reject his challenge." Id. (footnote omitted). Thus, under Irby, Likness's sufficiency-of-the-evidence argument likewise fails.
6. Likness also contends that the "jury instructions were plainly erroneous because they did not require the jury to find that [she] acted with intent to defeat the purposes of any or all of the listed public-assistance statutes." But this argument was also rejected by this court in Irby. Id., slip op. at 14-16. In Irby, this court determined that the district court's instructions regarding intent were not plainly erroneous because, "[a]lthough the district court did not use the statutory phrase 'with intent to defeat the purposes of,'" the court "instructed the jury that the state was required to prove that Irby 'willfully made a false statement or representation as to his income, assets, or bank accounts, or intentionally concealed a material fact as to his income or assets or bank account.'" Id. slip op. at 14. This court reasoned that the jury instruction "comports with the elements of the offense as described by the supreme court in Ibarra," and is "consistent with the standard jury instruction for wrongfully obtaining public assistance." Id., slip op. at 14-15. The same reasoning applies here. Accordingly, the district court's jury instructions were not plainly erroneous.
Unlike in Irby, Likness does not challenge the jury instructions with respect to the knowledge element. See Irby, slip op. at 15 (arguing that the "district court plainly erred by failing to instruct the jury that the state was required to prove that Irby knew that he was not entitled to public assistance at all or in the amount he was seeking"). --------
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED:
1. The district court's judgment is affirmed.
2. Pursuant to Minn. R. Civ. App. P. 136.01, subd. 1(c), this order opinion is nonprecedential except as law of the case, res judicata, or collateral estoppel.
Dated: March 9, 2021
BY THE COURT
/s/_________
Judge Francis J. Connolly