Robert J. Maddaus Jr. sits next to his lawyer in Thurston County Superior Court after he is sentenced to life in prison.
By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
This was updated at 7:08 p.m. and 8:36 p.m.
OLYMPIA – Robert J. Maddaus Jr., 41, of Rochester, was sentenced this afternoon to life in prison without the possibility of release for the first-degree murder of forty-year-old Shaun Allen Peterson.
Shaun Allen Peterson
Peterson died handcuffed and shot on an Olympia street early on Nov. 16, 2009.
It was a third strike for Maddaus.
Peterson’s 12-year-old son Joshua was among those who addressed the judge.
“He may not have been the best dad, but he was mine,” Joshua said.
Peterson, a father of two who lived in Tumwater before he died, was a drug dealer who was supplied by Maddaus.
Maddaus’s sentencing in Thurston County Superior Court followed his conviction by a jury last week of murder and numerous other charges related to a weekend of threats as he tried to recover cash and pounds of methamphetamine stolen from his Rochester trailer home.
Witnesses said Maddaus forced Peterson at gunpoint at the Lacey Fred Meyer to put on the handcuffs and then took him another drug dealer’s apartment on Capitol Way Southeast.
Peterson’s mother, Judy Peterson, told the judge her son loved the outdoors, wrote poetry and often teased people.
“He tried several times to get out of the drug world and helped others get out of the drug world,” she said. “He had the biggest heart.”
Peterson’s sister Gaylin Johnson said there were no words to make sense of the tragedy Maddaus brought on.
“He’s an arrogant, disrespectful, heartless human being,” Johnson said.
“Shaun’s death was no accident,” she said. “Bobby handcuffed my brother, shot him repeatedly and left him in the street to die alone.”
More than 50 individuals crowded into the courtroom, with many standing.
Maddaus, dressed in white prison garb, declined an opportunity to speak.
His defense attorney Richard Woodrow offered no words on his client’s behalf.
Deputy Prosecuting Attorney David Bruneau told the judge Maddaus had two prior most serious offense convictions: second-degree assault in Lewis County in 1993 and possession with intent to deliver while armed with a deadly weapon in Thurston County in 1995.
That made it a third strike, and a mandatory life sentence, he said.
Judge Christine Pomeroy was brief.
“At this time Mr. Maddaus, I will sentence you to life in prison without the possibility of release,” Pomeroy said. “The victim was handcuffed and vulnerable.”
Maddaus was sentenced also for two counts of unlawful possession of a firearm and four counts of witness tampering, as well as second-degree assault and attempted kidnapping for an incident three days before the shooting.
His lawyer said he will appeal.
“My opinion, I think this case is going to be back in Thurston County for a retrial,” Woodrow said after the proceedings.
Woodrow filed a motion for a new trial, he said, as his office received a typed but unsigned letter yesterday saying one of the juror’s family members who works in family court printed out and gave Maddaus’s criminal history to the juror.
If not for the life sentence, the number of months he faced, which included mandatory five-year firearm enhancements, added up to more than 500 months.
Recently elected Thurston County Prosecutor Jon Tunheim said because Maddaus is a persistent offender – from the state’s three- strikes law – those months basically “get consumed.”
“I think the community is a whole lot safer with him in prison,” Tunheim said after the proceedings. “That’s kind of the bottom line.”
•••
Read about the places in Lewis County Robert Maddaus hid out in the 11 days after the shooting until he was captured, here
Join us