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High court weighs whether prior jury verdict bars second commitment petition in TW case
Summary
Appellant TW argued that claim and issue preclusion should block the state from relitigating the same inability‑to‑care claim after a prior jury found no commitment was required; the state said newly obtained evidence, including about 40 minutes of body‑worn camera footage, justified a new petition and a new trial.
At oral argument in the Montana Supreme Court, appellant TW urged the justices to find that claim preclusion or collateral estoppel may apply to civil‑commitment proceedings in some cases and that the district court erred by allowing the state to try a second petition on essentially the same theory after a jury had already found TW did not require commitment.
Miss Peterson argued the second petition relied on the same substantive theory — that TW was "unable to care for her basic needs" — and largely the same witnesses and evidence as the first trial. She asked the court to reconsider a line of precedents (as discussed in argument and cited variously in the record) that the state read as categorically insulating subsequent petitions from preclusion doctrines. Peterson told the court: "This jury was tasked with relitigating a prior verdict." She urged that when a later petition is based on the same theory and…
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