Munger v. State

749 N.W.2d 335, 2008 Minn. LEXIS 281, 2008 WL 2200081
CourtSupreme Court of Minnesota
DecidedMay 29, 2008
DocketA06-1563
StatusPublished
Cited by32 cases

This text of 749 N.W.2d 335 (Munger v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Minnesota primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Munger v. State, 749 N.W.2d 335, 2008 Minn. LEXIS 281, 2008 WL 2200081 (Mich. 2008).

Opinion

OPINION

RUSSELL A. ANDERSON, Chief Justice.

The issue before us is whether the offense of first-degree burglary, which requires nonconsensual entry into a building with intent to commit a crime, requires that the intent must be to commit a crime within the building. Respondent Rickford Rehmann Munger was convicted of first-degree burglary following a guilty plea in Olmsted County. He subsequently petitioned to vacate his guilty plea, arguing that the plea was invalid because the factual basis did not establish an intent to commit a crime within the building. The district court denied the petition. On appeal, the court of appeals reversed, concluding that the burglary statute required that Munger have intended to commit a crime within the building, a fact not established at the plea hearing. Concluding that the plain language of the statute does not require intent to commit a crime within the building, we reverse and reinstate the judgment of the district court.

On the night of September 21, 2004, law enforcement responded to a report of a prowler at an apartment building in Rochester. A resident of a ground-level apartment explained that she had seen a man *337 walking around the area; that he walked by her apartment windows several times; and that he looked into the windows of her apartment and those of a neighbor’s apartment. From another room, she watched the man look into her open bedroom window, which did not have a screen, reach inside, and open the curtain. She provided the officer with a description of the man. The police located a man matching the description within a couple of blocks of the apartment building. The man identified himself as respondent Munger. The resident positively identified Munger as the man she saw peer in her window and reach inside.

Munger was charged with first-degree burglary, in violation of Minn.Stat. § 609.582, subd. 1(a) (2006).. Following a contested omnibus hearing and the denial of his motion to dismiss the charge for lack of probable cause, Munger entered a guilty plea to the charged offense in exchange for an agreement that the State would not pursue an enhanced sentence under the dangerous offender statute, Minn.Stat. § 609.1095, subd. 2 (2006). 1 During the plea colloquy, Munger admitted that he reached his. hand into the open window of the ground-level apartment and moved the curtain for the purpose of being able to look in and invade the privacy of the resident. See Minn.Stat. § 609.746, subd. 1(a) (2006). 2 Following a presentence investigation, the district court imposed the guidelines term of 60 months.

Munger subsequently petitioned for postconviction relief, seeking to withdraw his guilty plea on grounds that the plea was invalid. He argued that the burglary statute requires an intent to commit a crime within the building, but the factual basis for his plea established only “window peeping,” a crime that occurred outside the building. The postconviction court summarily denied relief, concluding that “[w]hile most burglary cases undoubtedly involve commission or an intent to commit a crime within the building, the statute makes no such geographic requirement.” On appeal, the court of appeals reversed, concluding that the statute “impostes] a requirement that, to be convicted of first-degree burglary * * *, a person must be shown to have intended to commit a crime within the building.” Munger v. State, 787 N.W.2d 604, 610 (Minn.App.2007). The court of appeals determined that Munger’s plea was therefore invalid and remanded the matter for further proceedings. Id. at 611. We granted the State’s petition for review.

A valid guilty plea must be accurate, voluntary, and intelligent. State v. Theis, 742 N.W.2d 643, 646 (Minn.2007). The accuracy requirement protects the defendant from pleading guilty to a more serious offense than he could properly be convicted of at trial. State v. Trott, 338 N.W.2d 248, 251 (Minn.1983). Accuracy requires an adequate factual basis to sup *338 port the charge. Theis, 742 N.W.2d at 647. The factual basis must establish “ ‘sufficient facts on the record to support a conclusion that defendant’s conduct falls within the charge to which he desires to plead guilty.’” State v. Iverson, 664 N.W.2d 346, 349-50 (Minn.2003) (quoting Kelsey v. State, 298 Minn. 531, 532, 214 N.W.2d 236, 237 (1974)). Munger’s claim is that his guilty plea is invalid because the factual basis for the plea does not establish that his conduct fell within a first-degree burglary offense, which he maintains requires intent to commit a crime within the building entered.

Statutory interpretation is a question of law, which we review de novo. Id. at 350. “A statute must be construed according to its plain language.” State v. Colvin, 645 N.W.2d 449, 452 (Minn.2002). “When the words of a law in their application to an existing situation are clear and free from all ambiguity, the letter of the law shall not be disregarded under the pretext of pursuing the spirit.” Minn.Stat. § 645.16 (2006).

Minnesota Statutes § 609.582, subd. 1, provides that “[w]hoever enters a building without consent and with intent to commit a crime, or enters a building without consent and commits a crime while in the building,” commits first-degree burglary if “(a) the building is a dwelling and another person, not an accomplice, is present in it when the burglar enters or at any time while the burglar is in the building.” 3 As a preliminary matter, the intrusion of any part of the actor’s person into the building, including the intrusion of a hand to open a window, constitutes the requisite entry. See State v. Nelson, 363 N.W.2d 81, 83 (Minn.App.1985); 3 Wayne R. LaFave, Substantive Criminal Law § 21.1(b), at 210 (2d ed.2003).

For purposes of this appeal, the salient language in the burglary statute is: “[wjhoever enters a building without consent and with intent to commit a crime, or enters a building without consent and commits a crime while in the building,'” commits burglary. (Emphasis added.) Using normal rules of grammatical construction, the plain language of the burglary statute formulates two separate and distinct means, signified by the disjunctive conjunction “or” and separated by a comma, by which a person can violate the statute. “[Ijn the absence of some ambiguity surrounding the legislature’s use of the word ‘or,’ we will read it in the disjunctive and require that only one of the possible factual situations be present in order for the statute to be satisfied.” State v. Loge, 608 N.W.2d 152, 155 (Minn.2000).

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
749 N.W.2d 335, 2008 Minn. LEXIS 281, 2008 WL 2200081, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/munger-v-state-minn-2008.