Victoria McCartney v. Taylor L. McGowan

Background

Plaintiffs Victoria McCartney, Shane McCartney, and their business Guerrilla Entertainment LLC (doing business as Midwest Drone Racing) are residents of Martin County, Minnesota, who became embroiled in a series of disputes with the City of Welcome and county officials. These disputes included a rejected pig statue donation to the Welcome Historical Society, conflicts over voting rights and city residency, and Shane's attempt to detach their property from the City.

The triggering incident for this lawsuit occurred at a Fox Lake Township Board meeting on March 4, 2024. Shane McCartney approached Diane Glidden — the wife of a city council member with whom Plaintiffs had a contentious history — and said, 'You fu--ing bi-ch, you better sleep with one eye open.' Ms. Glidden reported this to the Martin County Sheriff. The Martin County Attorney then prosecuted Shane for disorderly conduct under Minn. Stat. § 609.72 subdiv. 1(3). Shane moved to dismiss in state court, arguing his words were not 'fighting words.' The state court denied that motion, finding the statement could constitute fighting words in context. Shane pleaded guilty and on September 10, 2024 received a one-year stay of adjudication (a disposition under which the conviction is not formally entered if the defendant successfully completes a probationary period).

Plaintiffs then filed this federal lawsuit. At issue in the motion addressed by this opinion are Counts V and VI: a facial constitutional challenge to § 609.72 subdiv. 1(3) (Count V) and an as-applied constitutional challenge (Count VI) under the First Amendment. Both claims were directed at defendants Taylor L. McGowan (in his official capacity as Martin County Attorney) and Martin County (collectively, 'the County').

The Statute and Minnesota Precedent

Minn. Stat. § 609.72 subdiv. 1(3) makes it a misdemeanor to engage in 'offensive, obscene, abusive, boisterous, or noisy conduct or in offensive, obscene, or abusive language tending reasonably to arouse alarm, anger, or resentment in others,' when the person knows or has reasonable grounds to know it will tend to alarm, anger, or disturb others or provoke a breach of the peace.

The court examined Matter of Welfare of S.L.J., 263 N.W.2d 412 (Minn. 1978), in which the Minnesota Supreme Court held that the statute was facially overbroad and unconstitutionally vague but saved it by narrowly construing it to apply only to 'fighting words' — speech that is inherently likely to provoke violent reaction, would by its utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace, or would tend to provoke retaliatory violence or tumultuous conduct by those addressed. The court in S.L.J. held that context is critical to whether words are 'fighting words.' The court in this federal case determined that a 1991 legislative amendment to the statute made no substantive changes to the speech-regulating portion, so S.L.J. remains controlling.

Procedural Issues: Jurisdiction and Abstention

The County moved to dismiss under both Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(1) (lack of subject matter jurisdiction) and 12(b)(6) (failure to state a claim).

Rooker-Feldman Doctrine The Rooker-Feldman doctrine bars lower federal courts (except in habeas corpus proceedings, i.e., petitions challenging the legality of a person's imprisonment) from reviewing state court judgments. The court rejected this argument because Plaintiffs were not challenging Shane's conviction; they were seeking to prevent future prosecutions. Their claims focused on prospective harm, not review of the state court judgment.

Younger Abstention Under Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37 (1971), federal courts must generally refrain from interfering with ongoing state criminal proceedings that implicate important state interests and afford an adequate opportunity to raise federal questions. The court found Younger likely inapplicable because Shane's state case appeared to be concluded — the record showed a one-year stay of adjudication beginning September 10, 2024, with no subsequent filings, suggesting the case was ripe for dismissal as of September 10, 2025.

The court concluded there was no jurisdictional bar to proceeding.

Standing Analysis

Legal Standard Article III of the U.S. Constitution limits federal court jurisdiction to 'cases or controversies.' To establish standing, a plaintiff must show: (1) an injury in fact; (2) a causal connection between the injury and the challenged conduct; and (3) that a favorable ruling would likely redress the injury. In First Amendment pre-enforcement challenges, the standard is somewhat more lenient: a plaintiff may establish injury by showing an intent to engage in conduct arguably protected by the First Amendment but proscribed by the statute, combined with a credible threat of prosecution. A plaintiff may also establish injury by showing that they have self-censored their speech in an objectively reasonable response to the statute's threat of prosecution.

The Court's Analysis

Lack of Credible or Objectively Reasonable Threat of Prosecution

The court held that Plaintiffs' claimed chill on their speech was not objectively reasonable for several reasons:

1. The statute only reaches fighting words. Because S.L.J. narrowly construes § 609.72 subdiv. 1(3) to cover only fighting words, Plaintiffs' stated desire to use phrases like 'sleep with one eye open' or 'watch your back' in ordinary one-on-one conversations does not expose them to prosecution — unless they do so in circumstances that would amount to fighting words. Their fear of prosecution for using non-fighting words is therefore not objectively reasonable.

2. Shane's prosecution does not support a credible threat. The court found that Shane was not prosecuted merely for uttering 'sleep with one eye open.' He was prosecuted for calling the wife of a city council member with whom he had a contentious history a profane slur before saying that phrase. The state court found that the full statement, in context, could constitute fighting words. The court declined to credit Plaintiffs' characterization of Shane's statement as a 'conversational comment,' noting it was contradicted by Shane's own guilty plea and the state court's order.

3. No factual context supporting Victoria's self-censorship. The Amended Complaint contained no specific facts about the circumstances in which Victoria wished to use these phrases, making her claimed chilling of speech speculative rather than concrete.

4. Distinction from Susan B. Anthony List v. Driehaus. The Supreme Court in SBA List found standing where plaintiffs identified specific statements they intended to make and where the challenged statute was broad. Here, § 609.72 subdiv. 1(3) has been narrowly construed to cover only fighting words, and Plaintiffs did not identify specific speech they intended to use in contexts that would realistically risk prosecution.

5. Facial/overbreadth challenge deficiencies. For a facial overbreadth challenge, a plaintiff must show that third parties will be affected differently. While Plaintiffs argued in briefing that protesters or others might self-censor, the Amended Complaint itself only alleged that third parties are affected 'just as Victoria is' — which undermines an overbreadth argument rather than supporting it. The court reviewed the Amended Complaint, not the briefing.

Disposition

The court granted the County's motion to dismiss and dismissed Counts V and VI of the Amended Complaint with prejudice for lack of standing. The order specifies that judgment shall be entered accordingly. The remaining counts of the Amended Complaint (directed at other defendants, including the City of Welcome and the Welcome Historical Society) were not addressed in this ruling.