State v. Sullivan

After a bifurcated trial, a superior court jury first found the defendant, John Sullivan, guilty of the second degree murder of Lynne Rousseau and the first degree murder of Harry Pike, and then rejected Sullivan’s insanity defense, thereby affirming the guilty verdicts arrived at earlier. Sullivan appeals his convictions on the grounds that the Trial Court (Nadeau, J.) erred in denying both his motion for a mistrial, which argued that the State had improperly introduced character evidence that Sullivan was violent and a misogynist, and his motion to dismiss the first degree murder charge,…