No Jury Trial Right to Determine Factual Basis for Award of Restitution.

State v. Maxwell, Minn.Ct.App., 8/15/2011.  Mr. Maxwell procured more than two million dollars in fraudulent mortgage loans.  A jury eventually convicted him of eighteen felony counts of various sorts, after which Mr. Maxwell waived his right to a restitution hearing and agreed to submit that question on written materials.  The trial court ordered him to pay a lot of money.  On appeal, Mr. Maxwell said that he was entitled to a jury trial to determine the underlying facts on which the trial court based the award.

This is, of course, a Blakely argument.  So far, no court has held that a defendant is entitled to a jury trial on the issue of restitution.  The rationale for this conclusion is that restitution statutes have no upper bound and thus there is no upper dollar amount that exceeds any “statutory maximum,” which is what triggers Blakely.  So, Mr. Maxwell loses on this aspect of his restitution argument.

He also complained about certain of the restitution awards, in particular money for the victim’s inability to refinance his home mortgage following Mr. Maxwell’s identify theft.  The appellate court finds a direct casual link between the identity theft and the inability to refinance the mortgage, based upon the documents submitted to the trial court.