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STATE OF MINNESOTA IN SUPREME COURT A08-117

Benton County

Meyer, J.

State of Minnesota, Respondent, vs. Timothy James Peterson, Appellant. ________________________ Lawrence Hammerling, Chief Appellate Public Defender, Marie Wolf, Assistant Public Defender, St. Paul, Minnesota, for appellant. Lori Swanson, Attorney General, John B. Galus, Assistant Attorney General, St. Paul, Minnesota; and Robert Raupp, Benton County Attorney, Foley, Minnesota, for respondent. ________________________ SYLLABUS Excluding expert psychiatric testimony from the guilt phase of a bifurcated murder trial does not violate due process under the Minnesota Constitution. The evidence, viewed in a light most favorable to the verdict, was sufficient to support the district court's conclusion that the defendant had not proved his mental illness defense. Affirmed as modified. 1 Filed: May 7, 2009 Office of Appellate Courts

OPINION MEYER, Justice. Appellant Timothy James Peterson was convicted of first- and second-degree murder following a bifurcated trial where Peterson pleaded not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release. In this direct appeal, Peterson asks us to reverse his convictions based on two issues: (1) the district court violated his due process right under the Minnesota Constitution by prohibiting expert psychiatric testimony in the guilt phase of his bifurcated trial, and (2) Peterson presented sufficient evidence to prove his mental illness defense by a preponderance of the evidence in the mental illness phase of his trial. Alternatively, Peterson asks that his sentence be amended to life in prison with the possibility of release. We affirm Peterson's convictions, and we conclude that the statute mandating a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of release does not apply to Peterson's offense. The correct sentence is life in prison with the possibility of supervised release after 30 years. We affirm as modified. On March 18, 2005, Howard Hines was shot and killed while seated in the driver's seat of his vehicle, which was parked at his apartment building in Sauk Rapids, Minnesota. A resident of the apartment building discovered Hines inside his car and a number of bullet holes in the windshield. Right before discovering Hines, the resident saw Peterson, another building resident, lean out the window of his third-floor apartment and say, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I couldn't handle it anymore." Someone in the

apartment building had already called 911. 2

Peterson also called 911. Disjointedly, he told the operator that he had been having a tough time with people "tunin' " his head, he had "lost it," and had shot "one." He said he would be in front of the building when the "cops" came, although the police had already arrived from the earlier 911 call. Peterson came out of the building, where the police immediately handcuffed him. Peterson said that he had "shot him," and that he was "sick of [black people] around here messing with [Peterson]" on the computer. Peterson also told the police that the gun was up in his apartment. When the police searched Peterson's apartment, they found several shotguns and two rifles. The police also found a chair in front of a bedroom window that faced the apartment parking lot; a large ashtray full of cigarette butts sat on the window ledge. On the floor were four spent gun shell casings, and a fifth spent casing was in the parking lot directly below Peterson's window. These casings were from a .270 caliber rifle, the same type of rifle found in Peterson's apartment. Interrogations and interviews the same day and shortly after the murder indicated that Peterson had some sort of mental illness. Peterson's answers to police questions often failed to make sense; he talked about things such as being "hooked up" to a system with computers, and people "messing around" with him. But several of Peterson's statements were consistent with other evidence, and Peterson stated several times that he shot the victim. Peterson was charged with first-degree murder, Minn. Stat.

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