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St. Paul, Minn.

State Supreme Court rules against Hennepin County attorney in judge case

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(AP) - The Minnesota Supreme Court has ruled against the Hennepin County attorney's office in its attempt to remove a district judge from the trial of the man accused of killing 11-year-old Tyesha Edwards.

The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a lower court's decision to deny County Attorney Mike Freeman's motion to have Hennepin County District Judge Charles Porter removed from the murder trial of Myon D. Burrell.

Burrell has been charged with firing the shot that killed Edwards as she was sitting at her kitchen table in Minneapolis in November 2002.

Burrell was convicted in the killing, but in a previous ruling regarding Miranda rights and the admission of testimony by gang expert the state Supreme Court ordered a new trial.

Burrell has maintained his innocence.

Prosecutors have claimed that Porter should be removed because he expressed an opinion about it during a pre-trial conference on Jan. 16, saying the state should consider dropping the case.

In April 2007, the state Appeals Court rejected that argument and upheld a lower court's opinion that Porter should stay. On Thursday, a majority of the Supreme Court agreed in a ruling written by Chief Justice Russell Anderson. Justice Lorie Skjerven Gildea did not take part in the ruling.

Anderson wrote the state did not meet its burden to cause the removal of the judge "because the record does not show that the judge's comments regarding dismissal created a reasonable question as to his impartiality in the context of the case's history of disputes over the admissibility of expert gang testimony."

Porter has said that he had not made up his mind about the evidence in the case and can rule impartially.

Freeman said in a prepared statement, "We're disappointed in the court ruling, but it's one we have to accept and we'll now move forward to try the case."

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)