Star Tribune
Former judge, former public defender in Hennepin County Attorney race
In the race for Hennepin County attorney, voters will choose between two candidates who have differing views and experience with the criminal justice system and how to keep residents safe.
Martha Holton Dimick, 69, a retired Hennepin County judge, is running as a tough prosecutor while Mary Moriarty, 58, former Hennepin County chief public defender, is a reformer who wants to hold cops accountable. Both candidates agree that addressing gun violence and reducing recidivism are top priorities, but they have different ideas on achieving public safety.
Moriarty said data will guide charging decisions and policies to target implicit racial bias and root causes of crime. Holton Dimick wants repeat offenders to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
Moriarty has spent the majority of her career litigating against the office she seeks to lead, while most of Holton Dimick’s tenure was spent as a prosecutor and judge who worked for the County Attorney’s Office from 1999 to 2009.
Recently, a group of 32 senior prosecutors in the County Attorney’s Office penned a letter in support of Holton Dimick. Meanwhile, 41 staffers from the county’s public defenders office wrote in support of Moriarty, who also has the DFL endorsement.
Moriarty would be the first openly gay woman to lead the office and Holton Dimick would be the first Black woman to oversee Minnesota’s largest public law office, comprising 200 attorneys, 260 support staff and $69 million budget.
This is the first county attorney election since the murder of George Floyd, which placed the office under a national spotlight. Retiring County Attorney Mike Freeman charged former officer Derek Chauvin within days of the killing before the state Attorney General’s Office took over the prosecution.
Freeman was frequently criticized for convening grand juries to investigate fatal shootings of civilians by police. He later admitted this process lacked transparency, and both candidates vow greater transparency in the office if elected.
Grand juries for police misconduct
Holton Dimick: “I’d rather take it by a case by case basis … I’m not going to close the door on grand jury indictments, but I feel safer saying I would rather keep the decision myself. I don’t want to give those cases over to the AG office.”
Moriarty: “I would not use a grand jury just because of their secretive nature completely controlled by prosecutors, no defense attorneys or judges… I’m not sending cases to other county attorneys either because voters of Hennepin County will have elected me to make those decisions … I’d partner with the Attorney General on a case by case basis.”
Violent crime
Holton Dimick: “I think we have to send a message that we are not going to mollycoddle these violent criminals any further and we’re all to make sure that they are adequately punished. Victims are entitled to have relief. And so our community’s entitled to have relief. I want violent criminals held accountable. And I want the consequences to fit the crime.”
Moriarty: “I’m a big advocate of the Office of Violence Prevention. They are trying to train trusted messengers in the community to recognize when something’s brewing and train them with conflict mediation skills and try to interrupt violence before it happens … We should treat violence like a disease in approaching this entire system from a public health lens.”
Police misconduct
Holton Dimick: “I think we can do reform and public safety together. The Minneapolis Police Department, the culture is damaged. We didn’t need the Department of Human Rights to tell us that.” She said she voted no on the charter amendment to replace the MPD.
Moriarty: “Prosecutors see more video [body and dash camera] than police leadership … We’ll flag that and give it to police leadership so that they can have that conversation to interrupt behavior. Nip that in the bud before it gets worse.” She will not disclose how she voted on replacing the MPD.
Cameras in courtrooms
Holton Dimick: “We have open courtrooms. People are certainly invited and can come and observe any court proceeding that they want to … Other than the high-profile cases, no, I’m not a fan.”
Moriarty: “I think there is a place for cameras in the courtroom. I wish it would actually become more normalized in a way where people could see the ordinary day to day, not just something that’s sensationalistic.”
Diversifying juries
Holton Dimick: “There’s nothing wrong, I don’t see, with the process. I think it’s just that people don’t understand how it’s done, and that it is done totally anonymously … It’s kind of a disingenuous attack on the jury system.”
Moriarty: “I think we are way behind other states. We use driver’s licenses, voter registration and IDs. And other states use library cards, government assistance, all kinds of other lists, which would bring us a much more diverse jury. And so I am very much in support of that.”
New MPD Chief Brian O’Hara
Holton Dimick: “I’m really quite impressed with him. I think he’s going to come in and going to change that police department into a more progressive police department that is more engaged in the community.”
Moriarty: “He seems to be saying the right things and acknowledging there needs to be change to build trust in the community. He has worked under a consent decree and it appears we’re headed in that direction.”
CBRE, which marketed the property, declined to comment on the sale.
Adam Duininck, president and CEO of the Minneapolis Downtown Council, said while the low sales prices might sound alarming, there are bright spots. Homeowners in the city are facing a few tough years of property tax increases as commercial values drop, he acknowledged. But the lower prices have also enabled new players to buy downtown properties, paving the way for fresh ideas to transform the urban core.
“Hopefully, they come into the market with a certain kind of energy and optimism that helps drive the market back up,” he said, adding public safety improvements have also fueled recent momentum.
Take the Kickernick Building, which recently opened an art gallery. Earlier this year, Twin Cities-based United Properties sold the historic former warehouse on the edge of the CBD for $3.79 million. In 2017, United paid $19.5 million for the building.
Just a couple blocks away, Tom McCarver and Steve Boynton bought a mixed-use, nearly 31,000-square-foot building at the corner of Seventh Street and Hennepin Avenue that most recently housed Seven Steakhouse & Sushi. Last month, they paid about $4.3 million, slightly more than half of what it sold for in November 2017.
Tom McCarver, CEO of Hennepin Real Estate Partners LLC, poses Tuesday on the rooftop of the Stimson Building in Minneapolis that formerly housed Seven Steakhouse & Sushi. (Alex Kormann/The Minnesota Star Tribune)
After the restaurant closed during the pandemic, the building went into receivership and up for auction. McCarver and Boynton, executives at a company that owns billboards across the metro, were among nearly a dozen bidders. They won the auction in March, but because of “legal hurdles,” the sale didn’t close until last month.
A third wildfire burning within the Superior National Forest was discovered Tuesday near Bogus Lake in Cook County.
The fire, 45 acres in size, was active overnight into Wednesday as firefighters and aircraft continued suppression efforts, according to the U.S. Forest Service. The cause is unknown.
Bogus Lake is less than 20 miles northeast of Grand Marais.
A drought has put much of the upper Midwest, from northern Minnesota to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, under “above normal” conditions for potential wildland fire, according to the National Interagency Fire Center.
The Bogus Lake Fire is the second wildfire to be discovered in the Superior National Forest this week and the third one actively burning since early September.
Monday, a fire was detected on the eastern side of Shell Lake, about 4 miles north of Road 116 within the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, in St. Louis County. That fire is less than one acre, with the potential to spread east near Agawato Lake and the Sioux-Hustler Hiking Trail, the Forest Service said.
That fire grew to 45 acres and half of it was contained as of Oct. 1, according to the Forest Service. It is suspected of being caused by humans. Firefighters remain assigned to the fire.
Star Tribune
Duluth man involved in chaotic aftermath of fatal stabbing turns himself in 6 months later
DULUTH – On the mid-April night that Chantel Moose was fatally stabbed outside a downtown bar, Trayvon Joseph Walters fired at least two shots toward the fleeing suspect and a man who was pistol-whipping the accused. Then Walters took off for six months.
Walters, 27, traveled back from Colorado and turned himself in to local law enforcement officials on Wednesday morning, according to his attorney, assistant public defender Aaron Haddorff. He faces charges of second-degree assault with a dangerous weapon — along with unrelated charges of second-degree assault from 2020 — and appeared before Judge Eric Hylden in the afternoon at the St. Louis County Courthouse. His bail is set at $250,000.
Kimonte Travion Cadge, 26, who was taken to a hospital for the gunshot wound Walters allegedly inflicted, was charged with second-degree assault with a dangerous weapon. He was extradited from Cook County Jail in Chicago and was booked in St. Louis County Jail in September.
According to the criminal complaint: Moose and Plummer, who is friends with Moose’s ex-boyfriend, got into an argument after bar close on April 12 outside Spurs on 1st Street. A bouncer intervened, and Plummer reached over him to take a swipe at Moose with a knife with a 4- to 6-inch blade. Moose backed up and walked away before she dropped to the sidewalk.
When Plummer saw her fall, he took off running.
Cadge chased him, pistol-whipped him, then fired his gun at him. Walters, according to the criminal complaint, fired at least two shots toward both men, then left in a vehicle. Cadge retreated to a nearby apartment before he was transported to the hospital.
Moose was pronounced dead at a hospital, with a stab wound to the right side of her chest.
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