Stevenson: Stay and Disqualification Hearing (Doc. 544)

Accessible document transcript

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STATE OF MINNESOTA DISTRICT COURT

COUNTY OF OTTER TAIL SEVENTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT
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Craig Stevenson, Marie Stevenson,
Plaintiffs, File No. 56-CV-20-2928
vs. Transcript of Proceedings
Sean Stevenson, Renee Stevenson,
Lisa Stevenson-Allen, Ashley Anderson,

Defendants.

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MOTION
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The above -entitled matter came before the
Honorable Kevin M. Miller, Judge of District Court, at the
Otter Tail County Courthouse, via Zoom technology, Fergus Falls,
Minnesota, on September 16, 2024.
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APPEARANCES

For the Plaintiffs: Matthew Schaap
14985 Glazier Ave, Suite 525
Apple Valley, MN 55124

For the Defendants: Ross Tentinger
Lisa Stevenson-Allen, 14665 Galaxie Ave, Suite 140
Ashley Anderson Apple Valley, MN 55124

For the Defendants: Kirsten Hansen
Renee Stevenson, France Place
Sean Stevenson 3601 Minnesota Dr, Suite 450
Minneapolis, MN 55435
Dana Eifert
Official Court Reporter
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(Proceedings commenced.)
THE COURT: All right. Good morning, everyone.
At this time, the Court will call Craig Stevenson,
Marie Stevenson versus Sean Stevenson, et al; file 56-CV-
20-2928.
I have Mr. Schaap on behalf of the plaintiffs. I
have Mr. Tentinger here on behalf of, let’s see,
Ms. Stevenson-Allen and Ashley Anderson. I have
Ms. Hansen here on behalf of Sean and Renee Stevenson.
And is it Mr. Couillard?
MR. COUILLARD: Yes, Your Honor.
Stephen Couillard.
THE COURT: And are you with Ms. Hansen?
MR. COUILLARD: I am.
THE COURT: Okay.
MR. COUILLARD: I don't -- I don't anticipate
speaking.
THE COURT: Okay. All right. Thank you for
that.
All right. And we have two motions before the
court. The first motion we're going to address is the
motion for the stay of execution of judgment. I'll just
tell everybody we have about 30 minutes, so please keep
your arguments concise. I have reviewed the filings
prior to the hearing here today.
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Mr. Schaap.
MR. SCHAAP: Thank you, Your Honor. So this is
a motion to stay enforcement of the judgment. At this
stage, it doesn’t look like there’s any disagreement
among the parties about whether the stay is appropriate.
It looks like the disagreement is to the amount and form
of security.
The rules that apply don’t allow for security to be
in the form of cash held by the party that's seeking the
security, which, in this case, would be the defendants.
I -- there's no citation to the law, no precedent for
that. We've offered a letter of credit which is similar
to a bond. But costs a little bit less. It's in the
name of a bank. The bank pays it like a check. The bank
is the -- is the one that pays it. The plaintiffs do
not. So they don’t have authority or control.
As to the amount, the amount should not be in
controversy at this stage. We've offered and have a
letter for $70,000. The award in this case was $60,000
and change. We've added to that a significant amount of
interest. More significant than even an appeal to the
Minnesota Supreme Court would justify under the
circumstances. We -- if, if, if the Court looks at when
the judgment was entered in this case May 17, 2024, date
of entry or judgment, that's when interest started to
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accrue or starts to accrue. It couldn't have been
accruing during the period when the judgment was non-
appealable. That would be inequitable and it’s
inconsistent with Minnesota law, specifically the
Duluth Ready-Mix Concrete case we cited in our reply. So
as to the amount, the amount is more than sufficient and
we asked the Court to grant the motion, approve the
amount of $70,000, and the letter of credit I believe is
on file with the Court.
THE COURT: All right, Mr. Tentinger.
(Brief pause in the proceedings.)
MR. TENTINGER: I was muted. I apologize,
Your Honor.
Plain-- or excuse me, Plaintiffs’ reading of the
Rule 108.02 is incorrect. This Court has broad authority
to stay the judgment and how to choose the form of
security. The case cited by plaintiffs in their argument
or in their reply, DRJ v. City of St. Paul, does not hold
what they're saying it does. That Court of Appeals
expressly states that the court -- this Court has broad
authority to establish the form of the security. We are
asking and I'll be clear Your Honor, we are asking either
the money be paid into the Court or paid to Tentinger Law
Firm. And the only reason that the payment to Tentinger
Law Firm is even in consideration is, this is because
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that's exactly how plaintiffs initially made their
proposed stipulation to us to resolve this issue. But
they did not include any interest whatsoever. So
clearly, the defendants were not agreeable to doing so.
However, they already presented it once. There's no
reason why that's not a valid form of security at this
time, or alternatively, paying it into the courts, so
there's security there.
Craig Stevenson has a long history of doing whatever
he can to avoid making payments on behalf of Sean and
Renee. It goes all the way back to the divorce and the
contempt proceedings where he wasn't paying child
support. I think this is evidence that their intention
not to honor this is clear by the fact that by their own
calculation, this appeals process is going to take
through October 24th, 2025, but their letter of credit
expires a few months before then. So even if the appeal
process goes the way that they believe it will, the
letter of credit still is not going to be valid. I don't
think this is an oversight. This is from plaintiffs who
have looked up where Your Honor lives and how many
hearings you've addressed during certain periods of
times. To claim now that it was an error in when the
letter of credit expires, I think is disingenuous. For
all these reasons, we believe the most secure way to
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enforce this judgment through a stay would be a payment
either through -- to this firm, to be held in trust, or
alternatively, paid to this Court.
As far as the amount, based on my calculation that’s
in our memorandum, we believe that the amount needs to be
set at $76,000. That accounts for interest all the way
from October 13th, 2023. I know that issue is up on
appeal right now, but if it is affirmed then the interest
goes back that date, and if it isn't -- if it's
overturned well, then certainly then the defendants
wouldn’t be entitled to that interest, but it at least
needs to be accounted for in this security. And for that
reason, we believe that a payment to this Court or to
Tentinger Law Firm of $76,000 is required. Or
alternatively, if the letter of credit is sufficient, if
the Court wants to go with that, it at least has to
extend through the full process of appeals. It is simply
not going to be sufficient if it expires mid-appeal
process. I have nothing further, Your Honor. Thank you.
THE COURT: All right. Ms. Hansen
MS. HANSEN: Thank you, Your Honor. I actually
have nothing to add to what Mr. Tentinger said. I
believe it sums up nicely what our opinions are.
THE COURT: All right, then we'll move to the
plaintiffs’ other motion which is to disqualify and
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vacate. So, Mr. Schaap.
MR. SCHAAP: Thank you, Your Honor. And before
we move on, I'm not sure if I understand the expiration
argument that was just made.
THE COURT: Oh, -- I'm, yeah. I'm sorry. I'm
sorry. I should have given you the opportunity to
respond there. So go ahead, Mr. Schaap.
MR. SCHAAP: I don't understand the expiration
argument and the Court should and is empowered to order
security in a form acceptable to the Court in the form of
security. And the suggestion that there's some kind of
game being played with, with regard to the expiration
date the Court can simply order a replacement letter of
credit, if, if there's some kind of technical argument
they want to raise.
I would note too that the Court has sanctioned
parties in this case and that our clients have promptly
paid those sanctions. And so to the extent there’s some
kind of historical claim that the Stevensons don’t pay
their debts, that's absurd. They have operated a --
operated a successful business and were well known for
properly paying and paying in full, on time, every time.
So that's just a silly argument to go back and suggest
there's any kind of risk in that regard.
Moving on to the motion for recusal and vacatur.
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Your Honor, I was a law clerk in the Seventh District.
The thing I found most remarkable about the job straight
out of law school was the amount of power I had, and
maybe powers not the right word, but it was a really
stark contrast going from a student to going into
chambers with lawyers and a judge. Helping the judge
make decisions. Helping the judge write jury
instructions on very important matters for the litigants.
I found it remarkable to do that job for two years. I
developed a very close relationship with my judge. She
attended my wedding with her husband. I also clerked for
her husband on a conflict case in Mille Lacs County. I
developed a close relationship with my judge in just two
years. So this motion is a little bit different from my
perspective. I’ve also interviewed law clerks over the
years for jobs at our law firm. And many of the law
clerks I've talked to have had similar experiences. It’s
a very meaningful experience to be a law clerk, to be
behind the scenes and see how judicial decision-making
works. And so I bring that to the Court’s attention
knowing full well the Court is aware of how this system
is set up.
This Court doesn’t have time, a sufficient amount of
time, to do the amount of work that the Court has to do,
and law clerks play a critical role in that process of
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drafting and research. When I was in high school, I
mentored with what was essentially a law clerk, but in
California, they're called them research attorneys. And
I think the term clerk has the sort of administrative
sound to it when in reality what they're doing is the job
of a lawyer and it’s important work that they do.
And so to -- turning to this case, when it was
discovered that Mr. Morrison had apparently written or
participated in writing numerous decisions that were
pretty critical in this case to our clients, and that,
Mr. Morrison, the law clerk, had previously clerked for
Ms. Hansen's father, Judge Hansen, this raised some
questions and, and, initially it raised just the minimal
amount of scrutiny. Maybe some theories and some
questions. But as we dug into it further and as the
metadata on these orders reflected that more and more of
them had been written by or assisted in Mr. Morrison.
And as we looked at Mr. Morrison's background and
understanding that he was not just a one or two-year law
clerk like I was, moving on at some point to become a
lawyer, but he was more of a career law clerk that I
don't believe is licensed to practice in Minnesota, which
doesn't matter, but it, it would suggest that he doesn't
have aspirations to become an attorney at a law firm in
the state of Minnesota and is comfortable being a clerk
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long term. That's an asset to the court because that
institutional knowledge and the history that he brings to
the, to the, to the Otter Tail County Courthouse is
increasingly valuable every year. So as a clerk goes
from five years to ten years, they have a lot more
information about the system and just the practice of law
in the context of judicial decision-making. And so it's,
it's not illogical that he would have been brought into a
complex case like this. But at the time that he was
brought in to provide assistance, there was no disclosure
of the connection between Ms. Hansen and Mr. Morrison
being the former law clerk for Ms. Hansen’s father,
Judge Hansen.
And so under those circumstances, as we've
articulated under the Powell decision and I don't want to
take for granted either, Your Honor, that Mr. Morrison’s
-- we haven't, we haven't conducted discovery in this,
into these issues. We have not been privy to any behind-
the-scenes information that's not public. But what we
can see is, there are multiple letters from Mr. Morrison
to litigants indicating that he is Judge Hansen’s law
clerk. He identifies himself as a law clerk, as
Judge Hansen’s law clerk in multiple cases throughout the
2000s, and so that was part of what we, what we, based
this, this motion on. Because essentially, it's a motion
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based on the appearance of impropriety or the appearance
of bias, and what we looked at is what we had access to.
We had access to the Estate of Jeremiah Fiedler case.
The Linda Marie Blondeau case. The United Community Bank
versus Daniel Miller case. The Chris Helle versus
Stenerson Lumbar DBA Exteriors Unlimited case. And I
could go on with more and more cases where, where
Mr. Morrison identified himself as Judge Hansen’s law
clerk.
By having established that connection, the, the
really key part of this and I want to address some of the
arguments that have been made, understanding we only have
half an hour, so I'm not going to take Mr. Tentinger’s
time here, but the critical piece of this we believe is
that -- and the unfortunate reality is -- that this
should have been disclosed. It should have been brought
to the attention of the litigants, the plaintiffs in this
case, and it wasn't.
Under the Powell decision you see, Powell is a very
-- Judge Amundson’s wrongdoing was well known in the
state of Minnesota. It made headlines, obviously, it was
a big deal. And in the Powell case, you know,
Rich Ostlund -- and I have cases with him right now,
we’re on the same side, fortunately, -- but Rich was on
one side of that case representing Ms. Powell. And
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Eric Magnuson, Diane Bratvold, both of whom later became
judges with the, with -- who I've also worked with on
appeals -- they were on the other side of this for
Rider Bennett which is no longer in existence. But in
that case, you saw all of the arguments that were made to
the Minnesota Supreme Court, and the court sort of had to
deal with them how they had to deal. It was sort of with
reluctance that they one by one went through these
arguments that were made by Rider Bennett at the time.
And basically said, you know, there's really no way we
can get around this. There's an appearance of
impropriety. Judge Powell served on the three-judge
panel on the Court of Appeals that affirmed this
decision. And it went against Ms. Powell, and it went
kind of in favor of, of the attorneys at Rider Bennett,
who had essentially been Judge Amundson’s lawyers through
a trust. And they said, you know, we, we might not like
it, but we've got to do it in order to protect the
judicial integrity of our system. The appearance that,
that, people are going to take away from this if they see
that a judge on a three-judge panel is making a decision
that favors the law firm that represents him or has
represented him. And there the lawyers didn't even,
didn't even, work together. The trust lawyers were not
the same appellate lawyers, but the Court said that
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didn’t matter. Once that connection was established, the
appearance of impropriety required vacatur of that Court
of Appeals decision.
And what's important to recognize, in this case, and
in that one, is that the Court of Appeals initially
refused to vacate its own decision, saying that
Judge Amundson was one of three unanimous votes to
affirm, and there even that in the Minnesota Supreme --
and subsequently the Minnesota Supreme Court had denied
review. So it would appear that all of the law, the case
arguments, that have been made by the defendants are
summed up in Amundson and in Sigurdson. But the issue of
vacatur and recusal was not addressed. It was not dealt
with. And so the law of the case wasn't even discussed.
It was, it, it was an argument that was so far off base
that that nobody made that argument. And that argument
is equally inapplicable in this setting.
But the important piece to take away, Your Honor, is
that when the Minnesota Supreme Court fully analyzed
Powell, they looked at the decision of the, of the Court
of Appeals and said, the Court of Appeals was wrong
because even if Amundson was one of three votes and all
of those were unanimous, we still must protect the
integrity and the appearance of integrity in the system
of judicial decision making and cannot allow
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Judge Amundson presence on that panel to be viewed by the
public as impugning the integrity of the judicial system.
And so they vacated. And that is the, the, remedy and
the appropriate form of relief.
As you look at these cases, the Shell Oil case, I
mean the Federal Circuit is not applicable here. They,
they, -- I've, I've appeared before them in Washington,
DC, a couple of times, -- but that, that Federal Circuit
deals with very complex issues like patents and
trademarks. And what they said, in that case, is even
where there’s de novo review if the error is not harmless
-- and it's not here -- the de novo review does not
sanitize the underlying decision or give the public or
the judge the opportunity or right to say, recusal is not
needed because after all even if it goes up on appeal the
review is de novo and a de novo review will fix any
potential issue that was credited by the appearance of
impropriety. And, here, the problem is the appearance of
impropriety and we get through to the -- to the -- but
all of the factors as we argued under the Liljeberg
analysis as reflected in Powell are established. And as
we’ve fully briefed those, I’m not going to reiterate and
restate, but I wanted to just put a little bit more, more
context around why the appearance of impropriety.
We have a reasonableness standard. We don't have a
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different standard that applies whether someone would
reasonably believe under these circumstances that there's
a problem. I don't know how anybody could look at these
circumstances and -- I understand that the defendants
take a different position, I don’t think their position
has merit, but from a purely, we care about the system,
we want the system to appear fair to the reasonable
outside observer. These circumstances as, as we
currently see them in the public record don’t allow for
that. They would cause a reasonable observer to believe
that there's an appearance of bias or impropriety. And
for that reason, recusals needed, and vacatur is as well.
THE COURT: All right. Mr. Schaap, is it your
normal practice to put the location of the city of which
a judicial officer resides?
MR. SCHAAP: What was that?
THE COURT: I said is it your usual practice in
matters to put what city a judicial officer resides in?
MR. SCHAAP: No, it's not.
THE COURT: All right. And you agree it was
here though?
MR. SCHAAP: What was here?
THE COURT: That the -- my -- the city of my
residence was within your paperwork.
MR. SCHAAP: I believe so.
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THE COURT: All right. And tell me how that is
relevant to your motion here today.
MR. SCHAAP: It's -- much of what was provided
is context. We didn't bring this -- we didn't bring this
motion for actual bias. But as you can see from the
filings, there is a, there is an argument made by the
defendants and the defendants made this argument pretty
extensively in their, in their, papers. That the
decisions at issue all were essentially fair and
reasonable and down the middle and that not all of the
decisions that were authored by Mr. Morrison favored only
the defense. Some of them favored the plaintiffs as well.
Under the circumstances, the context of where people
reside or where people live is not, is not relevant, but
it's, but it's it was provided as additional context for
my client's declaration.
THE COURT: Yeah, I'm, I'm still trying to
figure out the, the context of how where the city I would
reside in provides extra context and that's what I'm
looking for, Mr. Schaap.
MR. SCHAAP: I don't have that, Your Honor. I
can’t speak to my client’s decision in including that in
his declaration. I did not draft the declaration.
THE COURT: Isn't it ultimately your decision
to submit that declaration?
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MR. SCHAAP: It is. I, I filed the
declaration. I did not draft the declaration.
THE COURT: That's not my question.
Ultimately, you determined it was appropriate to file
that declaration in this matter.
MR. SCHAAP: As context for the overall motion,
yes.
THE COURT: And that includes my city of
residence?
MR. SCHAAP: I, I believe that record speaks
for itself.
THE COURT: All right. Mr. Tentinger.
MR. TENTINGER: Thank you, Your Honor. I'll
try to be very brief.
I'll start with plaintiffs’ counsel. Plaintiffs’
counsel's anecdotal inability to remain impartial is
immaterial to the facts here. But to begin, defendant's
position is quite simple. The test for disqualification
is objective. The rule requires disqualification if a
judge's impartiality might reasonably be questioned. The
facts as alleged with respect to Clerk Morrison, excuse
me, fail to satisfy that test. And despite the lengthy
briefs and lengthy arguments here, plaintiffs have not
identified a single case where the judge or law clerk was
disqualified due to a former employer appearing before
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them, let alone where the family member of a former
employer appearing before the court mandated
disqualification. Analogists to the present alleged
facts are cases where a law clerk appears before a judge
they formally clerk for. It is well established that
such a past employment relationship does not disqualify
the judge. If a former clerk can appear before the,
excuse me, if a former clerk can appear before the prior
judge without causing concerns about bias, the logic
equally applies in reverse. A clerk is certainly capable
of maintaining impartiality if the judge they once worked
for appeared before them in the courtroom. Extending
that logic to this case, we reach the rational conclusion
that if a former law clerk can appear before their judge
and maintain impartiality, then surely that situation
here, -- the situation here is far less concerning. And
here it's not even the former employer directly involved,
it's the family member of that former employer. This
significantly and fatally weakens any argument offered by
plaintiff.
Clerk Morrison's impartiality could -- cannot
reasonably be questioned. This conclusion is only
strengthened by the fact that Ms. Hansen and
Clerk Morrison have never spoken and to Ms. Hansen's --
Hansen's knowledge have never met. There is no personal
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connection. There is no direct interaction and certainly
no evidence of any bias resulting from their association.
It is clear that plaintiffs’ argument is based on --
is not based on fact or relevant case law. When
reviewing their principal memorandum compared to their
reply, we can see how they introduced new facts at will,
relying heavily on conjecture and presumption rather than
the record. To overcome the fatal case law cited by
defendants, plaintiffs have constructed an alternative
narrative, now claiming that Clerk Morrison's connection
to Judge Hansen terminated only 13 months before this
lawsuit. However, their only support for this assertion
is their own presumption.
Notably, one of the reasons plaintiffs require so
many pages and take so much time during the hearing is
that their arguments are built on speculation and
conjecture. To reach their conclusions they need to
draft up alternative holdings, alter the facts, and
provide context that supports their speculation rather
than rely on the actual record or any straightforward
case summary.
Plaintiff’s alternate reality is an exercise in
fiction. To get a sense of just how frivolous their
motion is we can examine their efforts to distort the
case law to suit their narrative. For example, plaintiff
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cite to Vaska v. State an Alaska Court of Appeals case
from 1998. They attempt to argue that Clerk Morrison's
role in this matter is analogist to the law clerk in
Vaska, citing that Morrison was involved in drafting over
a dozen orders. However, plaintiffs misrepresent the key
facts of Vaska. The issue in Vaska was not simply that
the clerk's involvement in drafting of bench memorandum.
The real issue was that the clerk had improperly shared a
confidential bench memorandum with a district attorney
appearing in that case, going as far to include a note
that essentially states, look how hard I'm working for
the state. To equate a clerk drafting orders, in the
normal course of judicial work, like Clerk Morrison did
here, to blatant breach of confidentiality as in Vaska is
an extreme distortion of fact. Plaintiff’s argument is a
weak effort to make an unfounded comparison where none
exists.
In the end, the test for recusal is objective based
on what a reasonable person knowing all the facts; would
they question the court's impartiality? The test applied
to these alleged facts results in the undeniable
conclusion that disqualification is not mandated here or
even warranted. Plaintiff's attempt to relitigate their
claims must be denied, and for that, I will turn to my
co-counsel, Ms. Hansen.
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THE COURT: Ms. Hansen.
MS. HANSEN: Thank you, Your Honor. I just
have -- am going to try and keep as quiet as possible on
this particular motion, but I do want to point out
something for the Court’s knowledge. Mr. Schaap tried to
say that he hasn't had a chance to do discovery. He has
in fact reached out to me asking for my father's social
calendar and other things. So I am just here to say that
I have and I will declare this before the Court, to my
best knowledge, I have never met Clerk Morrison. If I
have, I'm sorry. I don't remember him. And I believe,
quite frankly, that this is an insult to the judicial
integrity here. Under Mr. Schaap’s theory, apparently, I
can never appear in Otter Tail County because
Clerk Morrison might somehow know me.
Again, that's a more visceral reaction, Your Honor.
This is why I'm leaving it to Mr. Tentinger to respond
more fully to this motion. Thank you.
THE COURT: All right. Mr. Schaap.
Ope you're on mute, sorry.
MR. SCHAAP: Yeah, we have not had an
opportunity to conduct discovery. I met and conferred
with Mr. Tentinger and asked very specifically if
Ms. Hansen would have any new information to provide
about the relationship with Mr. Morrison at this hearing.
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If we were going to be surprised by something. He
refused to provide any information. Essentially, said,
you'll have to ask Ms. Hansen, so we did that in the
letter, and in her response, she did not respond to most
of the line-by-line inquiries in our letter. But we were
simply trying to figure out what additional information
might exist, that might impact this motion.
I did want to -- I, what I’m struck by is sort of
the ships passing in the night that the plaintiffs and
the defendants seem to be in this, in this case. They,
they make these arguments sort of insulting our
arguments, but then they don't use any citations to the
record. And they don't cite any specifics. They come
into these oral arguments essentially resting on what
they've written. And without really explaining to the
Court why they're entitled to the relief they're entitled
to, and in the past that's been a fairly successful
strategy for the defendants.
I wanted to comment, Your Honor, I was not able to
locate the portion of the declaration that included any
reference to your address while I was, while I was
listening to Mr. Tentinger. But I believe that if I
recall there was some connection to the amount of time
that you must spend commuting and moving around. Which
simply gets to the issue of how difficult it is to do
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your job without significant assistance. Public records
alone reflect thousands of hearings, which get, gets to
your ability to, to get a lot done in a, in a short
period of time. But it also maybe speaks to a problem
with our system in that a case like this requires so
significant and such significant resources just to to
sift through the amount of information and data that
exists, that it can be difficult for a judge to, to do
that work, and that's where a law clerk, and in this
case, Mr. Morrison potentially fills that gap and plays a
really extensive role in the judicial decision-making
process. We didn't have any improper intent in providing
that additional context or analysis. But I believe that
was the -- that was why it was provided.
THE COURT: All right. And I’ll just note,
it's in the -- your filing -- your client's declaration
of July 26, 2024, paragraph 297. It doesn't give my
specific address, but it does say where my residence is
located in and which city. So.
MR. SCHAAP: And I, I, apologize if the Court
believes that's of concern. My apologies to the Court.
THE COURT: I think, I think, obviously, that's
why I'm bringing it up because I do believe it is a
fairly significant concern given judicial safety and some
of those, that I -- but it's there and it’s what it is.
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So, Mr. Tentinger, any response?
MR. TENTINGER: I would only rest on the fact
that if plaintiff’s argument relies on calculating how
much time you spend in commute each day, it shows the
frivolous arguments.
THE COURT: All right. So the Court is going to
--
MR. SCHAAP: Your Honor --
THE COURT: Mr. Schaap?
MR. SCHAAP: -- If you have concerns about the
public nature of that page, I -- we would certainly, I
mean the Court is, (indiscernible), I would be open to
sealing anything specific that the Court is concerned
with in terms of locating or filing that document under
seal.
THE COURT: And the court will take these
matters under advisement.
I am going to do some additional context here
because I believe it is necessary, as the -- was not
noted in some of the forensic is that I'm guessing at
least some of the initial orders would have been, and I
used the term “authored” because apparently, that's the
designation that Microsoft Word indicates as far as who
creates the document, I think that's a better term than
who authors them. But it would have been Ms. Kelly at
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the beginning. Then there were several orders that would
have been authored by Ms. Hovland, who left my employment
to go to private practice in the late summer of ‘22,
which is when I did request assistance because it was not
an easy time to get a law clerk. So that is when I did
request assistance. And just for the record,
Mr. Morrison started with Judge Mark Hansen in November
of 2013 and became Judge Sharon Benson's law clerk in
September of 2016. Which I will note, is more than four
years prior to the filing of the complaint in this
matter, and it would have been six years after the filing
of the complaint before Mr. Morrison had any other
participation in this matter.
I do believe that those are important matters, and
this Court does take the issue of recusal and that
information seriously as the plaintiffs did dig in and
found that I had recused myself from another file and I
had referred to that individual as an acquaintance of my
daughter. And I'm just going to note, I didn't fill out
the whole thing to say that her and her twin sister were
best friends with my daughter. That they would probably
spend four days a week at our house growing up, and that
I've attended weddings and everything else. So when
folks kind of make the comments, well, he saw it there.
It was fairly significant. I'm just noting that for the
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plaintiffs here, that I do take that seriously, so. I
will take this under advisement and will issue an order
in due course.
Thank you everyone.
MR. TENTINGER: Thank you, Your Honor.
MS. HANSEN: Thank you, Your Honor.
MR. SCHAAP: Thank you.
(Proceedings concluded.)

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STATE OF MINNESOTA IN THE DISTRICT COURT

COUNTY OF OTTER TAIL SEVENTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Craig Stevenson, Marie Stevenson,
Plaintiffs, File No. 56-CV-20-2928
vs. REPORTER’S CERTIFICATE
Sean Stevenson, Renee Stevenson,
Lisa Stevenson-Allen, Ashley Anderson
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
I, Dana Eifert, hereby certify that I am an official court
reporter in the Seventh Judicial Dis trict of the State of
Minnesota; that as such reporter I digitally recorded the
proceedings in the above -entitled action; that I thereafter
transcribed to typewriting the foregoing transcript from the
digital recordings taken in Otter Tail County, Minnesota on
September 16, 2024; and that the foregoing transcript consisting
of twenty-six (26) pages, constitutes a full, true, and accurate
transcription of said proceeding.
Dated: October 19, 2024

/s/ Dana Eifert
Dana Eifert
Official Court Reporter
c/o Otter Tail County Courthouse
121 West Junius Avenue
Fergus Falls, MN 56537
Telephone: 218-560-7068

56-CV-20-2928 Filed in District Court
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