Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe v. County of Mille Lacs, Minnesota

Background

The Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, Chief of Police Sara Rice, and Sergeant Derrick Naumann sued Mille Lacs County, County Attorney Joseph Walsh, and Sheriff Donald J. Lorge. The plaintiffs sought declarations and court orders concerning the Band’s law-enforcement authority within the Mille Lacs Reservation. An important issue was whether treaties and statutes from the late 1800s disestablished or reduced the reservation.

In an earlier order, the court found that it had federal-question jurisdiction and that the plaintiffs’ claims could be decided by a court. It also rejected several immunity defenses raised by Walsh and Lorge, including defenses based on the Tenth and Eleventh Amendments and absolute prosecutorial immunity. Walsh and Lorge appealed that order to the Eighth Circuit under the collateral-order doctrine, which permits certain appeals before the case is finished.

While that appeal was pending, the parties filed competing motions for summary judgment about whether the reservation had been disestablished or diminished. The plaintiffs argued that the appeal deprived the district court of authority to decide those motions.

Reasoning

The court explained that filing a notice of appeal generally transfers authority over the issues involved in the appeal from the district court to the court of appeals. The district court usually retains authority over matters unrelated to the appeal, but it may not proceed in a way that changes the case’s status before the appellate court.

The court recognized that an interlocutory appeal involving immunity does not always stop every district-court proceeding. Here, however, Walsh and Lorge’s appeal placed challenges to the district court’s authority before the Eighth Circuit. If the Eighth Circuit determined that the district court lacked authority over the claims against Walsh and Lorge, the district court’s ruling on reservation disestablishment could become moot as to them. The court also found it improper to proceed against the County alone while the other defendants’ appeal remained pending.

The court therefore concluded that it lacked subject-matter jurisdiction—that is, power to decide—the pending cross-motions for summary judgment while the appeal remained unresolved. The court did not decide whether the reservation had been disestablished or diminished.

Disposition

Judge Susan Richard Nelson ordered that the matter be stayed pending resolution of Walsh and Lorge’s appeal to the Eighth Circuit. The court deferred ruling on the parties’ cross-motions for summary judgment until the appeal was resolved and jurisdiction returned to the district court.