Avoiding the Rule 8 Question, Court Finds That Guilty Pleas Were Knowingly and Intelligently Made

Dikken v. State, Minn.S.Ct., 6/21/2017.  The state filed a criminal complaint that charged Mr. Dikken with two counts of second degree intentional murder.  At his second court appearance under Rule 8, Mr. Dikken did not offer to plead guilty to either or both of these counts. Rule 8 does permit a defendant to plead guilty except:

Subd. 2.Homicide or Offenses Punishable by Life Imprisonment.

If the complaint charges a homicide, and the prosecuting attorney notifies the court that the case will be presented to the grand jury, or if the offense is punishable by life imprisonment, the defendant cannot enter a plea at the Rule 8 hearing.

In the runup to the omnibus hearing Mr. Dikken tipped his hand by filing a petition to plead guilty to both of the second degree murder counts. This got the prosecutor's attention; the state notified the court that it was taking the case to the grand jury for indictment on first degree murder charges.  The court denied Mr. Dikken's petition to plead guilty.  The grand jury subsequently indicted Mr. Dikken on six counts of first degree murder charges.  He eventually entered pleas to two of those counts and is serving a life sentence without possibility of parole on one of them.

Mr. Dikken filed this post conviction petition in which he asked to be allowed to withdraw his pleas to the murder one counts and, instead, to be allowed to plead to the murder two counts.  Here's how Justice Stras characterized Mr. Dikken's argument:

According to Dikken, the district court committed an error of law when it failed to accept his petition to enter an unconditional guilty plea to the second-degree-murder charges at the plea hearing, which occurred weeks after the Rule 8 hearing and right after the State announced its intention to seek an indictment against Dikken on first-degree-murder charges. This error was so significant, in Dikken’s view, that it impaired his ability several months later to voluntarily and intelligently enter a guilty plea to the first-degree-murder charges

The court punts on the legal question whether the trial court committed a legal error by denying Mr. Dikken's petition to plead guilty.  Instead, Justice Stras deconstructs his claim that his guilty pleas were neither voluntarily nor intelligently made:

Dikken claims that he was left with “no meaningful choice,” which impaired his ability to both voluntarily and intelligently enter a plea, after the district court refused to accept his plea to the second-degree-murder charges and the grand jury indicted him on first-degree-murder charges. Factually, Dikken is incorrect because he still had a host of options available, including, among other things, proceeding to trial; entering into plea negotiations with the State; attempting to plead guilty to a lesser-included offense under Minn. R. Crim. P. 15.07; and requesting a stipulated-facts trial under Minn. R. Crim. P. 26.01, subd. 4, which would have fully preserved his argument that the court was legally required under Rule 8 to accept his unconditional guilty plea to the second-degree-murder charges. Dikken had meaningful choices, just not the specific choice he preferred.