As expected, George Kieran Daunt, a Dawson City gold miner convicted of the murder of Robert Truswell last month, is appealing his life sentence.

After a 22-day trial, a Yukon Supreme Court jury found Daunt guilty of fatally shooting Truswell in August 2003 in the Dawson gold fields.

Daunt was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for 10 years.

He is now serving his sentence at a penitentiary in British Columbia.

Daunt's Vancouver-based lawyer, Richard Fowler, filed an application for appeal with the Yukon Court of Appeal last Thursday. The appeal calls for an acquittal or a new trail.

The paperwork states the appeal is being made on grounds involving the 'question of law alone.'

Crown prosecutors Mike Cozens and David McWhinnie failed to fully and fairly cross-examine Daunt with respect to his state of mind at the time of the shooting, states the appeal.

During the trial, Daunt claimed he had shot Truswell in self-defence and had feared for his life.

The two men had feuded for years and Truswell had threatened to kill Daunt prior to the fatal shooting, the trial heard.

On the evening of Aug. 28, 2003, Truswell had arrived at Daunt's property in his truck and had accused Daunt of stealing his father's will.

An argument ensued and Daunt told the jury he'd felt threatened and suspected that Truswell might have had a gun. He fired a warning shot at Truswell, who then began to drive toward him. Daunt then fired two more shoots, which struck and killed Truswell.

Truswell was known as a town bully and had earned the name of Two-By-Four Bob following an incident where he had struck another man in the head with a piece of lumber in the 1980s.

The Crown submitted theories of Daunt's motive to the jury, the appeal papers say, adding the submission prejudiced Daunt's ability to make full answers in his defence.

During the trial's closing statements, McWhinnie suggested Daunt killed Truswell because he was mad that Truswell had entered an agreement with Daunt's father.

Truswell had been advising Daunt's father on how to evict Daunt from the land he had lived on for more than 20 years.

Daunt also believed his father had given Truswell a piece of machinery instead of lending it to Daunt, who needed it for his own mining operation.

Truswell wasn't looking for a fight, McWhinnie told the jury. Daunt had shot him only because he was angry at Truswell, he said.

Daunt was not questioned on these issues during the Crown's cross-examination while he was on the stand, and the suggestion was only made during the closing statements.

Because of this, Daunt did not have an opportunity to defend his state of mind, the appeal suggests.

During Daunt's time on the witness stand, he had repeatedly emphasized to the jury that he was convinced Truswell had arrived on his property to kill him.

'I was convinced that he was there to kill me,' Daunt said.

The trial's presiding judge, Justice Ron Veale, should have mitigated any prejudice caused by the Crown's closing statements during his instructions to the jury, the appeal states, but he didn't.

'(Veale) erred in his charge to the jury with respect to the definitions of the requisite mens rea for murder...' in the Canadian Criminal Code, the appeal documents states.

Mens rea is usually needed for a conviction in a murder charge. It suggests a state of mind where the accused is aware that what he or she is doing is illegal and acts with the intention of committing a crime.

Prior to the jury's deliberations, Veale instructed the jury members that if they believed Daunt's testimony that he was frightened for his life when Truswell arrived on his property, they must find him not guilty.

Canadian law states that if someone reasonably fears for his or her life, the taking of another life can be justified. A death threat could justify self-defence if the person honestly believed the threat would be acted on during the incident that called for the defence.

Daunt also could have been convicted of manslaughter, which would have suggested that Daunt had killed Truswell unlawfully, but without a mens rea, or a state of mind that was focused on murder.

Such definitions could have been taken into consideration by the jury when deciding if Daunt had intended to commit murder beyond a reasonable doubt. However, the appeal papers also argue that Veale erred in defining reasonable doubt to the jury.

The fact that Daunt was found guilty of second-degree murder suggests the jury believed Daunt had killed Truswell unlawfully and had done so with murder on his mind.

'The verdict of the jury was unreasonable and cannot be supported by the evidence,' state the appeal papers.

Fowler was unavailable to comment this morning.

Daunt's lawyers are expected to file an application for his release pending the appeal.