Topeka ? A man who claimed God told him to kill three people failed to convince the Kansas Supreme Court to strike down a state law preventing him from using insanity as a defense.

In a ruling Friday, the justices upheld capital and first-degree murder convictions of Michael A. Bethel of Girard. He was sentenced in Crawford County District Court to 100 years in prison for shooting his father, his father’s girlfriend and a nurse who cared for his grandmother at the family home in February 2000.

A key issue was how a 1996 Kansas law treats claims of insanity in criminal cases. Under that statute, Bethel could claim only that — because of a mental illness or defect — he really did not intend to kill his victims.

That law represented a break with the traditional standard, which is that a defendant who intended to kill is not guilty if a mental illness or defect prevented him from understanding that his actions were criminal. Kansas was the fourth state to adopt such a change, following Idaho, Montana and Utah.

In appealing his convictions, Bethel asserted that the law abolished the insanity defense, which he said was so rooted in legal tradition that the statute denied him his constitutional right to due legal process.

A unanimous Supreme Court disagreed, labeling his arguments “not persuasive.” The justices also suggested that the insanity defense had been merely “redefined.”

“Due process does not require that a state adopt a particular insanity test,” Justice Donald Allegrucci wrote for the court.

When Kansas legislators enacted their law on the insanity defense, the American Medical Assn. was advocating the “evil mind” standard eventually adopted.

The AMA and other supporters of the change said the standard was less confusing for jurors to apply than the older standard.

“There is no backing away from the requirement that the state prove every element of the offense charged by proof beyond a reasonable doubt,” Allegrucci wrote.