Nicole Mitchell has been found guilty by a jury on both charges. The Democratic Minnesota state senator was accused of burglarizing her stepmother’s Detroit Lakes home.
The jury began deliberating on the fourth day of testimony regarding the charges against Sen. Nicole Mitchell of Woodbury and delivered a verdict after about three hours. It has not yet been read in court. She was charged with felony first-degree burglary and possession of burglary or theft tools after the alleged break-in on April 22, 2024.
In his closing argument, Becker County Attorney Brian McDonald asked the jury to trust what they heard from Nicole Mitchell in body camera footage.
“What the defendant said in those tense moments after being detained by the police is the truth, period,” McDonald said. “She said she was there to take items, and that readily proves her intent to commit a theft.”
In the defense’s closing, attorney Bruce Ringstrom Jr. reiterated Nicole Mitchell’s assertion she broke into her stepmother’s home for a welfare check, which could be called “poor judgment” but is not tantamount to burglary.
“The state needs you to believe that Nicole Mitchell would … throw away her career, that she would throw away her family and she would throw away her ability to be a foster parent for a shirt she knew that she was going to get,” Ringstrom said.
Nicole Mitchell pleaded not guilty, and during the trial, her defense contended she was at the home to check on her stepmother, Carol Mitchell, who lives with Alzheimer’s.
The embattled senator spent more than five hours on the witness stand during the trial, testifying about her relationship with her stepmother, the alleged rift that occurred over her father’s death and lack of will and Carol Mitchell’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis.
“I always remember Carol being in my life, and as a mother figure,” Nicole Mitchell said.
Carol Mitchell also took the stand, telling jurors she and her stepdaughter were not particularly close and saying she felt “extremely violated” after finding Nicole Mitchell in her home.
Jurors also saw body camera footage of the police response to Carol Mitchell’s 911 call about the alleged burglary, during which Nicole Mitchell told one officer, “I know I did something bad.”
Nicole Mitchell has survived multiple expulsion attempts by her Republican Senate colleagues, but the body’s DFL Caucus did remove her from committee assignments and caucus meetings days after her arrest.
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