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487.40 Notice to remove.

Subdivision 1. Interest or bias of judge. No judge shall sit in any cause if interested in its determination, or if the judge might be excluded for bias from acting therein.

Subd. 1a. Application. The provisions of sections 542.01 to 542.12 and 542.17 shall apply to actions in the county court.

Subd. 2. Initial and subsequent disqualification. (a) Any party or the party's attorney, to a cause pending in a court, within one day after it is ascertained which judge is to preside at the trial or hearing thereof, or at the hearing of any motion or order to show cause, may make and file with the court administrator of the court in which the action is pending and serve on the opposite party a notice to remove. Thereupon, without any further act or proof, the chief judge of the judicial district shall assign any other judge of any court within the district to preside at the trial of the cause or the hearing of the motion or order to show cause, and the cause shall be continued on the calendar, until the assigned judge can be present. In criminal actions the notice to remove shall be made and filed with the court administrator by the defendant, or the defendant's attorney, not less than two days before the expiration of the time allowed the defendant by law to prepare for trial and in any of the cases the presiding judge shall be incapacitated to try the cause. In criminal cases, the chief judge for the purpose of securing a speedy trial, may in the chief judge's discretion change the place of trial to another county.

(b) After a litigant has once disqualified a presiding judge as a matter of right under this subdivision, the litigant may disqualify the substitute judge, but only by making an affirmative showing of prejudice. A showing that the judge might be excluded for bias from acting as a juror in the matter constitutes an affirmative showing of prejudice. If a litigant makes an affirmative showing of prejudice against a substitute judge, the chief judge of the judicial district shall assign any other judge of any court within the district to hear the cause.

HIST: 1971 c 951 s 40; 1973 c 679 s 37; 1978 c 647 s 1; 1979 c 233 s 16,17; 1986 c 444; 1Sp1986 c 3 art 1 s 82

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Revisor of Statutes