Judge overturns Minneapolis man's 2009 murder conviction after AG office's investigation

MINNEAPOLIS — A judge has overturned the 2009 murder conviction of a Minneapolis man following an investigation by the Minnesota Attorney General's Office.

In 2009, Edgar Barrientos-Quintana was charged with and convicted of first-degree murder in the death of 18-year-old Jesse Mickelson. He was serving a life sentence without parole for the conviction.

In a petition to the court, Barrientos-Quintana argued he had ineffective counsel and the state did not disclose exculpatory evidence as required by law, among other issues. On Wednesday morning, a judge granted the petition, vacating his conviction and sentencing and ordering him released from prison pending a new trial. 

"The Court simply cannot express any confidence that, if Mr. Barrientos-Quintana had reasonable counsel, or if the prosecutors had complied with their duty to disclose, the jury would still have convicted him," Judge John McBride wrote in his order. "Mr. Barrientos-Quintana did not receive the fair trial to which he was entitled. The Court must grant his petition and order a new one."

The Hennepin County Attorney's Office subsequently dropped the charges against Barrientos-Quintana.

"We are grateful that the judge agreed to vacate Mr. Barrientos-Quintana's conviction, issuing a lengthy order reflecting a thorough review of the evidence," the attorney's office said in a statement. "We immediately moved to dismiss the case. We will have more to say publicly on this matter next week. For now, our thoughts are with Mr. Barrientos-Quintana and the family of Jesse Mickelson."

Attorney General Keith Ellison said cases like Barrientos-Quintana's are why he founded the Conviction Review Unit.

"My thoughts are with Jesse's friends and family, who lost him to a senseless act of violence, and who are still waiting for justice," Ellison said. "Mr. Barrientos was deprived of his freedom, and his loved ones were deprived of his presence, for the last 16 years. This case underscores the importance of reviewing claims of wrongful convictions without fear or favor, and when evidence leads to the conclusion that the wrong person was convicted of a crime, acting to correct that injustice."   

Conviction Review Unit's investigation

The Conviction Review Unit of the Minnesota Attorney General's Office recommended the conviction be reversed in August after a three-year investigation. Two months later, the Hennepin County Attorney's Office filed a petition agreeing with the recommendation.

Mickelson was shot and killed in his neighbor's driveway in Minneapolis in October 2008. Barrientos-Quintana's conviction was based, in part, on eyewitnesses who identified him as the shooter. The Conviction Review Unit said it verified Barrientos-Quintana was in Maplewood – which is roughly 15 miles on the other side of the metro area from Minneapolis – at the time of the shooting using phone records and surveillance footage — neither of which was presented at trial, the unit said.

The unit said it found other flaws in the initial investigation, such as violations of eyewitness identification protocol and a failure to "seriously consider and rule out plausible alternative suspects." 

Members of Mickelson's family also supported overturning the conviction.

When the attorney's office announced its support, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara stood by the investigators who worked on the case. 

"I am concerned that a convicted killer will be set free based only upon a reinterpretation of old evidence rather than the existence of any new facts," he said.

Barrientos-Quintana was 25 at the time of conviction. He is now 41.

Note: The video above originally aired Oct. 11, 2024.