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Gregory B. Schultz said he waived Tschumper’s first appearance in court Monday on three misdemeanor charges of being a public nuisance by obstructing a roadway and annoying the public. Because the charges came on tickets, only an offense and an offense date are listed, Schultz said. He wants criminal complaint documents filed to find out the details of the offenses and get a better idea of what the state is claiming.
Assistant Houston County Attorney Araysa Ashmore will have 30 days to file the narrative-style complaints. Although not the norm, filing complaints for misdemeanor tickets is not unusual, she said.
Misdemeanor tickets don’t extensively chronicle alleged crimes. For example, a speeding ticket might just say “speed” and may list how fast the defendant was going, Ashmore said. Unless the officer writes more notes on the back, tickets don’t usually provide much more information than that, she said.
Ashmore said she hasn’t had a chance to go through the police reports to see why the tickets were issued.
Tschumper, 58, told the Daily News one ticket came a few months ago after a hired hand forgot to close a gate. The other occurred three weeks ago when a cow escaped through a previously unnoticed hole in a fence. Tschumper said the cows were wrangled within 10 minutes on both occasions.
He pleaded guilty in January to being a public nuisance and paid a $137 fine. He had been warned 11 times between April and October 2007 and was finally ticketed on Oct. 17.
Tschumper said the whole situation is an “ongoing epic of the law versus my cows” that may have begun by grudge-holding neighbors he sparred with in a property-line dispute years ago.
A new court date will be set for Tschumper once the complaints have been filed.
Kevin Behr is a reporter for the Winona (Minn.) Daily news.
