Seventh Judicial District · Otter Tail County
Civil rulings and appellate outcomes
Minnesota’s Code of Judicial Conduct calls for fair, impartial, and open-minded judging. Rule 1.2 calls for conduct that promotes public confidence in judicial independence, integrity, and impartiality. This page examines Judge Miller’s rulings in Stevenson v. Stevenson, No. 56-CV-20-2928, alongside hearing records, appellate outcomes, and other public cases.
Justice-Denied assigns F for serious concerns in the reviewed civil record. The Stevenson order analyses document concerns at several consequential stages; the three-case discovery comparison identifies limits the written decisions do not explain consistently. The Court of Appeals held that a Stevenson privilege order exceeded the court’s authority. In a separate criminal case, it found an abuse of discretion in Nettestad, while deeming that error harmless. It also found an abuse of discretion in Merrill, reversing and remanding a restitution order that lacked the required express ability-to-pay statement while affirming the conviction and sentence.
How we grade judges →Justice-Denied’s historical collection contains 20 original AI assessments covering 19 selected orders in Stevenson v. Stevenson. The orders date from March 2021 through August 2026. The December 18, 2024 order decided both recusal/vacatur and Rule 11 sanctions; those decisions have separate assessments. The chart preserves the 20 original scores; the linked analyses identify their models and available source records.
About the analyses. The −10 to +10 scores are the original AI assessments published with the linked analyses. Each analysis identifies its model and available source records. The early analyses helped shape Justice-Denied and expressed concerns Craig and Marie Stevenson recognized from their own courtroom experience. Later reporting carries forward the research and corrections first published on October 19, 2026, while preserving the original assessments as historical documents. Cross-case examples below are outside this selected Stevenson sample.
Later reporting: Revisiting Our Early AI Analyses: The Record, the Law, and Our Experience; Motion to Amend Complaint; When Judge Miller Left Disputed Facts to a Jury.
These four orders shaped discovery, pretrial rulings, summary judgment, and recusal in Stevenson v. Stevenson. The scores are the original AI assessments preserved with the linked analyses, not court or disciplinary findings. Each link opens the full analysis and identifies the underlying order and hearing record.
Recusal context: The December 2024 motion concerned file metadata attributing at least 14 orders to a law clerk who had previously worked for retired Judge Mark Hansen, father of defense counsel Kirsten Hansen. Judge Miller denied recusal and vacatur, and the Minnesota Court of Appeals affirmed. The linked public-record account presents the concern, the court’s response, and the appellate outcome.
Beyond Stevenson
In Hammes v. Magnuson, Judge Miller allowed 31 interrogatories despite a challenge that their subparts exceeded Rule 33’s limit, citing their relationship and good cause. In Stevenson, he capped requests for admission at 50 per defendant under Rule 36, which sets no fixed numerical cap. In Svendsen, he granted a protective order after more than 300 admissions requests. The cases differ, but the written decisions do not explain a consistent principle for these limits. Review the comparison and source records.
Judge Miller denied a stay while discussing reconsideration, called requests for admission “interrogatories” in the operative text, and omitted the next sentence of a quoted passage about their purpose. The written order did not explain the $999 expense calculation, and a catch-all denial left its scope unclear. The official May and November hearing transcripts have now been reviewed. They supply neither an oral stay analysis nor an itemized calculation of $999. The September order separately decided the June motions, resolving the catch-all’s possible effect on whether those motions remained pending. Read the analysis and primary-source index.
Judge Miller found factual disputes over liability in Svendsen but granted the HRA summary judgment because the submitted damages information did not establish a genuine factual dispute. A defense filing two days earlier reported $1,934.20 in documented relocation expenses. The filed June 22 transcript records Svendsen identifying supplemented U-Haul, fuel, and lodging records; Buck declined a further response. The written order does not address that supplementation. The order named Rules 60.02 and 54.02, but its memorandum analyzed only Rule 60.02. Read the updated analysis and source index. Compare the discovery and summary-judgment rulings in Stevenson and Svendsen.
In State v. Nettestad, the Minnesota Court of Appeals held that Judge Miller abused his discretion by allowing medical conclusions on an ultimate legal issue, but found the error harmless. It separately reversed an improper conviction and remanded for resentencing.
Read the documented Nettestad analysis Read the appellate opinion
In State v. Merrill, the Minnesota Court of Appeals held that Judge Miller abused his discretion by awarding restitution without expressly stating, orally or in writing, that he considered Merrill’s income, resources, and obligations. It reversed and remanded the joint-and-several restitution order for the required statement. The court affirmed the conviction and prison sentence.
Read the documented Merrill analysis Read the appellate opinion
In Schumacher-Cookman v. Schumacher, Judge Miller dismissed two claims but allowed three to proceed, stating in a 2020 order that credibility could not be decided at summary judgment. After both parties waived a jury, he held a bench trial and denied the surviving claims and slander-of-title counterclaim in his 2023 findings. The disputed facts were resolved after testimony.
In Christiansen Keefe v. Kronemann Construction, Inc., No. 56-CV-23-1802, Miller permitted recording of a disputed psychological examination and allowed punitive-damages pleading because reasonable, contestable inferences could support jury findings. These plaintiff-favorable rulings provide concrete comparisons with his Stevenson decisions. The parties settled at mediation on July 22, 2025; the case did not produce a jury verdict. Sources: Index #43, October 18, 2024, p. 5; Index #61, March 28, 2025, pp. 19–20; Index #74, July 23, 2025, p. 1. Use the case number and Index number in MCRO.
Justice-Denied reviewed 105 Otter Tail County civil cases with jury-trial settings from May 2018 through August 2026. Of the 43 assigned to Judge Miller, none produced a jury verdict deciding contested liability. One produced a completed damages-only verdict in a case first assigned to Judge Waldemar B. Senyk.
For a closer look at different paths toward factfinding, compare Svendsen, Starkebaum, and Wynn.
Read the full countywide jury-trial analysis Compare the three jury-path cases
The following biographical information appears on Judge Miller’s official Minnesota Judicial Branch profile (last verified August 26, 2026):
Minnesota Judicial Branch
Appointed / elected
Appointed on May 7, 2018, by Governor Mark Dayton. Elected in 2020. Current term expires Jan. 2027.
Education
Past employment
Professional memberships
About the author
Craig StevensonCraig Stevenson is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Justice-Denied.org. He is President and CEO of Stevenson Technical Services, Inc. (STSI), which traces its roots to Craig’s Radio & TV, founded in 1979 and renamed STSI in 1989. He also founded and operated C&R Cable Company, Inc. from 1981 until its sale in 1989. Craig and his wife, Marie, have been married for more than 36 years and are the parents of two adult daughters.
