State v. Eide

898 N.W.2d 290, 2017 WL 2332724, 2017 Minn. App. LEXIS 68
Court of Appeals of Minnesota·Decided May 30, 2017·No. A16-1373·Published

Opinion

OPINION

ROSS, Judge

When Inez Eide arrived at the Minneapolis—-St. Paul International Airport and prepared to pass through a. security checkpoint to meet a young relative at a gate, she put her purse, which contained a loaded handgun, onto the x-ray conveyer, Airport police issued Eide a citation for violating an airport ordinance. Eide argues on appeal from her conviction that the ordinance is prohibited by Minnesota Statutes section 471.633 and is unconstitutional as a strict-liability offense. Because the Metropolitan Airports Commission is not a “governmental subdivision” or other entity prohibited from regulating firearms under section 471.633, and because the strict liability of the, ordinance does not violate Eide’s constitutional rights, we affirm.

FACTS

. Inez Eide-went to the Minneapolis—St. Paul International Airport in June 2015 to pick up her minor niece, who was arriving on a flight unaccompanied by an adult. Eide obtained a gate pass so she could meet her niece as she deplaned. Eide put her purse on the security , checkpoint conveyor to be scanned. But she left her loaded handgun, inside, and security personnel discovered it. Eide told airport police that she had forgotten about the gun. Police charged Eide with violating a Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC) ordinance prohibiting anyone from putting a [292] firearm through inspection equipment at a security screening area without first informing security personnel about the gun.

Eide argued to the district court that the ordinance is barred by Minnesota Statutes section 471.633, which restricts certain entities from regulating firearms, and that the ordinance violates the Due Process Clause and the Second Amendment by establishing a strict-liability firearm offense. The district court rejected the statutory argument, reasoning that a different statute authorizes the MAC to enact ordinances and that section 471.633 does not limit that authority. The district court also rejected Eide’s constitutional arguments. The parties submitted the case for trial on stipulated facts, and the district court found Eide guilty of violating the ordinance.

Eide appeals.

ISSUES

I. Does Minnesota Statutes section 471.633 prohibit the MAC from regulating firearms in airport security screening areas?

II. Does MAC Ordinance 117.6.5 violate Eide’s constitutional rights by establishing a strict-liability offense for placing a firearm in a security screening device without declaring the firearm to security personnel?

ANALYSIS

I

Eide challenges the validity of the ordinance she violated. She argues that the MAC ordinance prohibiting a person from putting a firearm in a security inspection device without first notifying security personnel is preempted by a Minnesota statute that reserves the exclusive authority to regulate firearms for the legislature. The allegedly invalid MAC ordinance provides in relevant part as follows:

No Person shall place a firearm ... onto inspection equipment at a Security Screening Area without first declaring such item to the Screening Personnel....
To comply with federal regulations regarding prohibited items in the Sterile Area; to make screening operations more efficient and transient; and, to further promote the public safety and welfare of the Airport and its travelers, this provision is to be a strict liability offense. This provision is violated whether or not the Person had intent or knowledge that the item placed on the inspection equipment contained a firearm....

MAC, Minn., Ordinance 117.6.5 (2013).

The statute that Eide says prohibits the ordinance states as follows:

The legislature preempts all authority of a home rule charter or statutory city including a city of the first class, county, town, municipal corporation, or other governmental subdivision, or any of their instrumentalities, to regulate firearms, ammunition, or their respective components to the complete exclusion of any order, ordinance or regulation by them except that:
(a) a governmental subdivision may regulate the discharge of firearms; and
(b) a governmental subdivision may adopt regulations identical to state law.
Local regulation inconsistent with this section is void.

Minn. Stat. § 471.633.

The legislature has specifically authorized the MAC to adopt ordinances related to the management of its airports and has established that violations are misdemeanors. Minn. Stat. § 473.608, subd. 17(1) (2016). Additionally, although the MAC is a “public corporation” for some purposes, [293] Minn. Stat. § 473.603, subd. 1 (2016), for other specified purposes the legislature has deemed any airport authority of the state to be a “municipality,” Minn. Stat. § 360.031 (2016), and it has afforded each of these “municipalities” the power “[t]o adopt and amend all needful ... ordinances for the ... use of any properties under its control” and “to appoint airport ... police, with full police powers” to enforce its ordinances, Minn. Stat. § 360.038, subd. 3 (2016).

We must decide whether the limits imposed by Minnesota Statutes section 471.633 prevent the MAC from adopting its firearm-placement restriction embodied in MAC Ordinance 117.6.5. This statutory interpretation and application issue is a question of law, which we review de novo. See Rushton v. State, 889 N.W.2d 561, 563 (Minn. 2017).

We begin by addressing some apparent confusion over the operative phrase in section 471.633, “The legislature preempts all authority of a home rule charter or statutory city including a city of the first class, county, town, municipal corporation, or other governmental subdivision, or any of their instrumentalities, to regulate firearms .... ” We construe a statute’s words and phrases according to the rules of grammar and according to their common usage. Minn. Stat. § 645.08(1) (2016). A bit of a grammar problem appears in the district court’s treatment of this phrase. The district court construed this language to mean that section 471.633 applies only to “a home rule charter or statutory city,” treating the phrase as though all the terms that follow the word “including” are merely examples of “home rule charter or statutory cit[ies]” and implying that cities are the only entities preempted from regulating firearms. The meaning of the phrase’s terms and its punctuation lead us to believe that the district court based its conclusion on a misunderstanding.

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State v. Eide, 898 N.W.2d 290, 2017 WL 2332724, 2017 Minn. App. LEXIS 68 (Mich. Ct. App. 2017).

898 N.W.2d 290 (State v. Eide) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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