Plea agreement reached in fatal laundry shooting

Published 8:42 am Thursday, January 13, 2011

DULUTH, Minn. — The man accused of fatally shooting a Laundromat caretaker in an argument over money has pleaded guilty to reduced charges in an agreement with prosecutors in northeastern Minnesota.

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Terence Leon Callender was indicted by a grand jury on a charge of premeditated first-degree murder in the 2008 shooting death of 64-year-old James Alton Peterson outside the Hillside Laundry in Duluth. Callender on Wednesday pleaded guilty to intentional second-degree murder. He’s to be sentenced Friday.

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Two people told Duluth police that Callender admitted shooting Peterson in an argument over $20 in July 2008.

The Duluth News Tribune says Callender has agreed to serve a 28-year prison sentence. A conviction on the previous charge against him carried a mandatory life sentence.