Susan Esther Safstrom v. Justina Elise Morin, and Justina Elise Morin obo minor children v. Susan Esther Safstrom ( 2016 )

This opinion will be unpublished and
may not be cited except as provided by
Minn. Stat. § 480A.08, subd. 3 (2014).
STATE OF MINNESOTA
IN COURT OF APPEALS
A15-1879
Susan Esther Safstrom,
Appellant,
vs.
Justina Elise Morin,
Respondent,
and
Justina Elise Morin obo minor children,
Respondent,
vs.
Susan Esther Safstrom,
Appellant.
Filed September 19, 2016
Affirmed
Ross, Judge
Beltrami County District Court
File Nos. 04-CV-15-2584
04-CV-15-2499
Susan Esther Safstrom, Bemidji, Minnesota (pro se appellant)
Justina Elise Morin, Bemidji, Minnesota (pro se respondent)
Considered and decided by Stauber, Presiding Judge; Ross, Judge; and Johnson,
Judge.
UNPUBLISHED OPINION
ROSS, Judge
Justina Morin and Susan Safstrom are neighbors who each filed a petition for a
harassment restraining order against the other to settle a lengthy feud mostly about smoke
emanating from fires on Morin’s property. The district court granted Morin’s petition
against Safstrom but denied Safstrom’s petition against Morin. On appeal, Safstrom argues
that there is insufficient evidence to establish that she engaged in more than one incident
of harassment. Because we conclude that the district court did not err by finding that
Safstrom harassed Morin by repeatedly approaching or entering Morin’s property
uninvited and yelling at her children, we affirm.
FACTS
Susan Safstrom and Justina Morin are neighbors in Beltrami County. The two had
been in a lengthy quarrel by August 2015 when each filed a petition for a harassment
restraining order against the other. In the previous months, the two argued about smoke
that drifted onto the Safstrom property from fires on the Morin property.
The district court considered both petitions together at a hearing where the parties
presented conflicting testimony about the purpose of the fires. Morin testified that she lit
about 20 fires throughout the summer near the side of her house so her four young children
could roast marshmallows. She said that on the day before she filed her petition, Safstrom
came on her property, yelled at her, and accused her of lighting fires to expose her children
to smoke so that they might become disabled, allowing Morin to collect welfare. Morin
also said that Safstrom would stand at the end of her own driveway and had “yelled stuff”
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at her children. She added that Safstrom would film her home. Morin testified that her
children can no longer play in their driveway because “[Safstrom] is always yelling at
[them].”
Safstrom offered a different motive for Morin’s fires. She asserted that Morin really
intended to harass her with the smoke. She testified that Morin was burning garbage and
grass, and she claimed that the smoke made her ill. She opined that Morin lit the fires to
retaliate for Safstrom’s previous complaints to Morin critical of Morin’s having loud guests
late at night. Safstrom admitted that she had been video-recording Morin’s property, but
she maintained that she intended only to document the excessive smoke. The recordings
include footage of the smoke, and include Morin’s children. Safstrom admitted to making
the welfare comment and that she did so in a “fit of anger.”
The district court reviewed photographs and video recordings. The photographs
depict a smoke plume that is substantially more voluminous than one would ordinarily
associate with a campfire. The district court pressed Morin about the amount of smoke,
and she admitted that she did burn some grass on one occasion. She maintained that she
never burned any garbage. She denied that she lit the fires to bother Safstrom.
The district court granted Morin’s petition and denied Safstrom’s. Safstrom now
appeals the harassment restraining order against her.
DECISION
A district court may issue a harassment restraining order if it has “reasonable
grounds to believe that the respondent has engaged in harassment.” Minn. Stat. § 609.748,
subd. 5(b)(3) (2014). “Harassment” is defined in relevant part as “repeated incidents of
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intrusive or unwanted acts, words, or gestures that have a substantial adverse effect or are
intended to have a substantial adverse effect on the safety, security, or privacy of another.”
Minn. Stat. § 609.748, subd. 1(a)(1) (2014). We review the grant of a harassment
restraining order for an abuse of discretion, and we will reverse if the order is not supported
by sufficient evidence. Kush v. Mathison, 683 N.W.2d 841, 843–44 (Minn. App. 2004),
review denied (Minn. Sept. 29, 2004). The district court’s fact-findings will not be set aside
unless they are clearly erroneous, and we defer to the district court’s credibility
determinations. Id.In concluding that Safstrom engaged in harassment, the district court found that she:
[M]ade uninvited visits to the Petitioner(s) as follows:
Respondent came onto Petitioner’s property uninvited on
numerous occasions to complain about her activities and those
of her guests.
[F]rightened Petitioner(s) with threatening behavior as
follows: Respondent yelled at Petitioner and her children.
[T]ook pictures of the Petitioner(s) without permission of the
Petitioner(s) as follows: [Safstrom] repeatedly filmed
Petitioner, her home and activities of those at her home.
[Safstrom] admitted telling Petitioner in anger (Petitioner’s
children were present) that Petitioner wanted to cause her
children a disability by exposing them repeatedly to the smoke
of outside fires so she could collect more welfare.
Safstrom concedes that her welfare comment was an incident of harassment. But she argues
that we must reverse because it is the only incident of harassment supported by the record.
Peterson v. Johnson, 755 N.W.2d 758, 766 (Minn. App. 2008) (“One incident of an
intrusive or unwanted act is insufficient to prove harassment if there is no infliction of
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bodily harm or attempt to inflict bodily harm.”). We agree that there is not much
harassment here, but the evidence supports the district court’s findings that Safstrom
repeatedly harassed Morin by yelling at her children.
Safstrom concedes that she yelled from her own property on multiple occasions. But
she asserts that Morin made no allegation that the yelling frightened or threatened her or
her children. The argument is belied by Morin’s petition and supporting affidavit. And it
is belied by testimony credited by the district court. Morin swore in her affidavit that
Safstrom scared her children. And Morin testified that Safstrom was “always yelling at
[Morin’s] kids” while they played, so they could no longer play in their circular driveway
or “in the front yard.” Although the allegation is not developed in detail, it sufficiently
supports the finding that the children were frightened by Safstrom’s behavior.
Safstrom also contends that the yelling incidents do not constitute harassment
because they were only vaguely alleged and the mere act of yelling is not objectively
unreasonable. It is true that the evidence regarding the yelling incidents is not precise.
Morin stated only that on an unspecified number of occasions, Safstrom “[came] to the end
of [Safstrom’s] driveway and yell[ed] stuff at [her kids].” But a lack of specificity as to the
date or content of the interaction does not prohibit the finding of an incident of harassment.
See Kush, 683 N.W.2d at 844 (citing Davidson v. Webb, 535 N.W.2d 822, 823–24 (Minn.
App. 1995)). Safstrom is also correct that yelling does not by itself constitute harassment.
See Dunham v. Roer, 708 N.W.2d 552, 567 (Minn. App. 2006) (noting that the statute
“requires both objectively unreasonable conduct or intent on the part of the harasser and
an objectively reasonable belief on the part of the person subject to harassing conduct”),
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review denied (Minn. Mar. 28, 2006). Words can of course be yelled without being
“intrusive or unwanted.” Minn. Stat. § 609.748, subd. 1(a)(1). But in the context of the
ongoing feud, it was not an abuse of discretion for the district court to find that Safstrom’s
yelling was intrusive or unwanted, frightening Morin’s children.
The district court also supported its order with its finding that Safstrom repeatedly
filmed Morin’s home. The problem here is that if Safstrom believed that Morin was
engaging in harassment or otherwise creating a nuisance, we see nothing in the
antiharassment statute (or in any other statute referenced by the district court or the parties)
that prevents her from collecting video evidence of the alleged nuisance so that she could
support her claim in court (or use the footage for any other lawful purpose). That the video
recording occasionally included incidental images of Morin’s children somewhere in the
frame does not mean that the recording constituted harassment. We add that the images of
the children are arguably relevant here; they could bear on Morin’s claim that the fires were
mainly for roasting marshmallows. We agree with Safstrom that the filming as it occurred
here, without more, does not constitute harassment as described in the statute. We do not
address any implicit First Amendment issues.
But the district court’s finding that the filming constitutes harassment is not
necessary to its decision. The district court found (and Safstrom admitted) that Safstrom
on multiple occasions engaged in the yelling either on or at the edge of Morin’s property.
And the district court found that this conduct frightened the children, crediting Morin’s
account that Safstrom’s conduct altered how the children use the property. We are satisfied
that these constitute “repeated incidents of intrusive or unwanted acts, words, or gestures
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that [had] a substantial adverse effect or are intended to have a substantial adverse effect
on the safety, security, or privacy of another.”
Safstrom further challenges the harassment restraining order on the grounds that the
district court judge was biased and denied her adequate time to present her case. We have
reviewed the record and see no hint of support for the arguments.
Affirmed.
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