North Dakota Supreme Court splits 3-2 on first DAPL appeal

Kevin Decker's probation ended one month before the North Dakota Supreme Court upheld his trial and misdemeanor conviction related to a Dakota Access Pipeline protest.

One of the first defendants arrested and charged from the monthslong demonstrations, Decker was convicted at trial a year ago of disorderly conduct. He appealed, alleging insufficient evidence and a "closed" courtroom as one man was denied entry during jury selection. Justices heard arguments in November and issued differing opinions on Thursday.

The high court's ruling comes one month after Decker's unsupervised probation ended as part of his deferred imposition of sentence — meaning if he fulfilled his probation with no criminal violations and paid his fees, the conviction will be taken off his record after a review to be completed in late March.

In the majority affirmative opinion, Justice Daniel Crothers wrote that excluding one member of the public from trial was "too trivial" to violate the Sixth Amendment right to a public trial, while evidence was sufficient to convict Decker.

Read more: http://bismarcktribune.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/nd-supreme-court-splits---on-first-dapl-appeal/article_6add3656-94ce-56c3-9e84-e69a8d0e9655.html