This opinion will be unpublished and

may not be cited except as provided by

Minn. Stat. § 480A.08, subd. 3 (2014).

STATE OF MINNESOTA

IN COURT OF APPEALS

A15-0705

Dennis M. Skrzypek,

Relator,

vs.

Doc Holliday’s Roadhouse,

Respondent,

Department of Employment and Economic Development,

Respondent.

Filed January 11, 2016

Affirmed

Ross, Judge

Department of Employment and Economic Development 

File No. 33357036-3

Dennis M. Skrzypek, Aitkin, Minnesota (pro se relator)

Doc Holliday’s Roadhouse, Houston, Texas (respondent employer)

Lee B. Nelson, St. Paul, Minnesota (for respondent department)

Considered and decided by Ross, Presiding Judge; Chutich, Judge; and 

Hooten, Judge. 
2

U N P U B L I S H E D O P I N I O N

ROSS, Judge

Dennis Skrzypek quit his job as a cook in Williston, North Dakota, to return to 

Minnesota to address his wife’s threat to claim falsely that he had assaulted her. The 

department of employment and economic development denied his request for 

unemployment benefits and an unemployment-law judge upheld the denial. We affirm the 

finding that Skrzypek quit his job without a good reason caused by his employer. 

FACTS

Dennis Skrzypek began as a cook at Doc Holliday’s Roadhouse in Williston, North 

Dakota, in September 2014. Skrzypek quit the job three months later because he wanted to 

return to Minnesota after his wife threatened to file domestic-abuse charges against him. A 

day after he returned, his wife filed the charges, and the district court soon dismissed them 

because they lacked evidentiary support. 

Skrzypek applied for unemployment benefits, but the department found him

ineligible because he quit his job. He appealed and an unemployment-law judge (ULJ) 

affirmed the decision after a hearing. The ULJ believed Skrzypek’s testimony about his 

reason for quitting but rejected his appeal because Skrzypek failed to establish that his 

employer caused his reason for quitting and because he failed to demonstrate that any other 

exception to quit-ineligibility applied. The ULJ upheld that decision after reconsidering it. 

Skrzypek appeals by certiorari.
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D E C I S I O N

We review a ULJ’s determination that an applicant is ineligible for unemployment 

benefits de novo but rely on the ULJ’s fact findings if they rest on substantial support in 

the record. Fay v. Dep’t of Emp’t & Econ. Dev., 860 N.W.2d 385, 387 (Minn. App. 2015). 

An employee who quits employment generally is ineligible for unemployment benefits. 

Minn. Stat. § 268.095, subd. 1 (2014). One exception is when the employee quit because 

of a good reason that his employer caused. Id., subd. 1(1). This case focuses us on that 

exception.

Skrzypek asserts that the circumstances that forced him to quit were beyond his 

control. It appears that the ULJ accepted this assertion and that he considered Skrzypek’s 

reason for quitting to be a good one. The ULJ rightly concluded, however, that despite the 

reasonableness of Skrzypek’s decision to quit, the reason was not caused by his employer. 

Skrzypek acknowledged so much in his hearing before the ULJ, saying that he faced no 

adverse working conditions, no coworker conflicts, and no other workplace circumstance 

that led him to quit. He emphasized that he returned to Minnesota because his wife 

threatened to file the false charges against him after he confronted her about relational 

issues, believing he needed to address the pending charges immediately. We are bound by 

the statute in limiting the exception only to reasons to quit that were caused by the 

employer, and Skrzypek does not contend that his employer had anything to do with the 

domestic disorder that precipitated his quitting. And he does not contend that any other 

statutory exception to ineligibility applies. 
4

Skrzypek implies that because Doc Holliday’s Roadhouse did not participate in the 

hearing before the ULJ, it essentially conceded that his contention was sound. But 

unemployment benefits are paid from state funds, and a claim for those benefits is not a 

claim against the employer. Minn. Stat. § 268.069, subd. 2 (2014). An employer’s 

nonparticipation in the proceedings therefore does not influence the legal question of

whether the statute authorizes an award of benefits. Rasidescu v. Comm’r of Econ. Sec., 

644 N.W.2d 504, 506 (Minn. App. 2002), review denied (Minn. July 16, 2002).

We must affirm the decision. 

Affirmed.