Jack Joseph Ball didn't convince the court that mental illness made him not responsible. A Dakota County District Court judge has found that the 25-year-old Lakeville man failed to prove his mental illness defense in the killing of Bethany Ann Israel of Bloomington and her unborn child, the Dakota County Attorney's Office said.
Israel was Ball's sister. County Attorney Kathy Keena announced the verdict Oct. 20 and said Judge Bryce A.D. Ehrman decided it. The trial was split into 2 phases. In the first, on Jan. 21, 2026, Ball pleaded guilty to 1 count of premeditated first-degree murder and 1 count of premeditated first-degree murder of an unborn child. In the second, Ball raised a mental illness defense, and the court found he "did not meet his burden in proving the defense."
That bar is high. Under Minnesota law, a defendant has to show that mental illness kept them from understanding what they were doing, or from knowing it was wrong, when the crime happened.
Israel was 30 and 17 to 18 weeks pregnant when she was killed on May 23, 2024, at Ball's home in Lakeville. Prosecutors said she had gone there for dinner. When she didn't come home, worried family members sent a relative to check, and that relative found blood inside the house and called police. Officers later found Ball covered in blood in a Rosemount backyard, with self-inflicted injuries. The Hennepin County Medical Examiner's Office ruled Israel's cause of death "complex homicidal violence."
Ball was first charged with 2 counts of second-degree murder on May 29, 2024. At the time, prosecutors noted the killing "may have been premeditated," pointing to journals in which Ball reportedly wrote about his anger over his sister's pregnancy. A grand jury indicted him on Jan. 9, 2025, on 2 counts of premeditated first-degree murder and 2 counts of intentional second-degree murder.
Sentencing is set for Thursday, Oct. 22, at 1:30 p.m. in Hastings. First-degree premeditated murder carries a mandatory life sentence in Minnesota. Ball remains in the Dakota County Jail.
