Duluth man found not guilty by reason of mental illness in hammer attack

The criminal case against Lance Alexander Tolbert ended with a not-guilty-by-reason-of-mental-illness verdict, but the harder public question now is what happens next for treatment, supervision and safety after a violent attack on a stranger in Duluth.

Judge Theresa Neo, who serves in Minnesota’s Sixth Judicial District, found Tolbert not guilty by reason of mental illness in the May 24, 2024, attack at Mount Royal Market. Tolbert had been charged with attempted premeditated first-degree murder after prosecutors said he used a hammer to attack 81-year-old Bradley French in the supermarket bathroom. French survived, but earlier reporting said he suffered a skull fracture, a broken hand and multiple lacerations and puncture wounds.

The case drew attention because French and Tolbert did not know each other. French told police he had never spoken to Tolbert before the attack, and charging documents described the assault as random. Police found Tolbert about 15 minutes later, walking away from the grocery store. Officers said he was carrying a hatchet and had blood on his clothing and face when he was arrested. Tolbert was later held in the St. Louis County Jail on $500,000 bail.

The verdict resolves the criminal charge, but Minnesota law allows civil-commitment proceedings to follow a not-guilty-by-reason-of-mental-illness finding. State statute also says that when a commitment petition is filed immediately after such an acquittal in a crime against a person, the verdict itself can serve as evidence that the proposed patient has a mental illness and is dangerous to the public. That is the legal bridge from criminal court to the civil system, where questions about treatment and confinement are handled differently.

For St. Louis County residents, the significance reaches beyond one courtroom. The ruling closes a case that began with a stranger attack in a public place on Woodland Avenue, but it also puts the county’s mental health and court systems at the center of the next phase. The criminal prosecution is over. What follows will determine whether Tolbert is committed for treatment and how the court system weighs his condition against the safety of the public.