Star Tribune
Suspect in St. Paul shooting was city employee
The man arrested for allegedly shooting an 18-year-old in the head outside St. Paul’s Jimmy Lee Recreation Center on Wednesday was a staff member who has worked there for about a year.
The circumstances behind the shooting remain murky. Mayor Melvin Carter and St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry shared details Thursday, with Carter revealing that the 26-year-old man suspect worked for the city on an “on-and-off basis” since 2013. He was recently employed at the recreation center as a community recreation specialist, a role that involves direct contact with youth and community members.
Carter and Henry did not reveal what led up to the shooting, saying it remained under investigation. The 18-year-old victim remained in critical condition at Regions Hospital.
Although police released the man’s name, the Star Tribune generally doesn’t name suspects until they are charged. His Minnesota criminal record amounts to minor offenses including misdemeanor theft, marijuana possession and driving without a license. The victim’s family asked that his name remain private.
“We are shocked by this, and I am one of those parents who sends my children to our rec centers,” Carter said, adding that he and his father grew up visiting the Jimmy Lee Recreation Center. “We just came out of a two-and-a-half hour meeting with our frontline staff to address questions exactly like [whether there will be increased security measures] … and at this point, we have to be in a space where everything is on the table.”
In the meantime, city officials are not rushing to reopen the space at 270 Lexington Pkwy. N.. Carter said their priority is caring for young people and staff who may have been traumatized, as Parks and Recreation Director Andy Rodriguez said it’s likely that 100 kids or less were at the center during the shooting.
Although the Jimmy Lee Recreation Center was closed Thursday, vestiges of the crime scene remained. Tattered caution tape clung to trees outside the building. A discarded surgical glove covered by snow lay in the parking lot. An onlooker drove past the building, peering at the entrance doors before pulling away. An announcement on the center’s website said they are closed through Sunday.
City officials described the Oxford Community Center, which includes the Jimmy Lee Recreation Center, as a multimillion-dollar facility with an aquatic center and recreation center that draws people from across the region — a prototype for a space that Carter says “we know that we need for our children.”
Across the street, Central High School’s doors were also shuttered Thursday “to ensure students have time and space to process this traumatic event,” according to an email that Principal Cherise Ayers sent to families. Carter said he does not remember a time that a school has closed because of violence like this.
The incident happened in the center’s parking lot, according to Henry, but police are still piecing together what led up to the violent interaction between that staff worker and the teen. The worker fled after the shooting, but Henry said they found him and the firearm involved afterwards. Records show he was arrested in the 1600 block of Stillwater Avenue E.
Carter would like to prevent incidents like this by reducing the availability of firearms. He’s urging DFL lawmakers to reconsider a law that prohibits cities from prohibiting firearms at public facilities like rec centers.
“If everybody has a gun then every conflict has a potential of turning into a gunfight, and that creates challenges not just for St. Paull, but around the country,” Carter said.
Carter said he spoke with Gov. Tim Walz and state legislators Wednesday night and said their conversations focused on unraveling and addressing the shooting
For now, police said there is no continued threat stemming from Wednesday’s shooting. Families and community members who rely on recreation centers should continue to do so, Carter said.
Tammie Johnson, a former community recreation specialist who worked at the rec center and lives nearby, said the night of the shooting that she was upset and that more should have been done to prevent it. She said she resigned after she was attacked by a teenage girl.
“It’s so sad,” Johnson said. “I told them last year if they don’t get it under control this was going to happen.”
Star Tribune
Former Hubbard County official, school bus driver gets six-year sentence for sex crimes against students
A former Hubbard County commissioner and school bus driver was sentenced Friday to six years in prison for sex crimes involving minors.
Daniel J. Stacey, 60, was charged in April 2023 with criminal sexual conduct and electronic solicitation of a minor, both felonies, in Beltrami County District Court. He was then charged in November with nine additional felony counts related to criminal sexual contact with a minor.
Stacey pleaded guilty in June to four felony counts as part of a plea deal that dropped the remaining charges. His attorney, Joseph Tamburino, declined to comment Friday on the sentence, and officials with the Nevis school district did not immediately respond to requests seeking comment.
Stacey resigned from the Hubbard County Board in January 2023 and was placed on leave from his school bus job during an investigation by the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) that began after the parent of a Nevis student filed a complaint.
In an email Friday, Hubbard County Administrator Jeffrey Cadwell said he had no comment other than that Stacey’s actions “did not occur within the course and scope of his duties with the County and the County was completely unaware of them.”
According to a criminal complaint, Stacey offered to mentor a 13-year-old male on his bus route. He brought the boy to his property, asked him to watch pornography and tried to touch him in a sexual manner, court documents state.
The boy told investigators that Stacey told him not to tell anyone, and helped him rehearse what to say about doing chores at his property. Investigators said they found footage showing times Stacey would deactivate the school bus camera when the boy was the only student left on the bus.
A second criminal complaint outlines similar allegations against Stacey with a minor who was 14 years old.
Star Tribune
Woman charged as investigation into attack on north Minneapolis homeless shelter continues
A 33-year-old woman has been charged with two felonies in connection with an attack on a north Minneapolis homeless shelter that forced 54 women and children to relocate last week.
Eureka D. Riser, 33, of Minneapolis, is charged with second-degree rioting with a dangerous weapon and first-degree damage to property, according to the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office. She was in custody Friday, a day after Minneapolis police confirmed her arrest.
Riser, also known as Eureka Willis, is alleged to have been in a group of at least three people who on Sept. 5 went to St. Anne’s Place, 2634 Russell Av. N., and threatened residents, smashing doors with a baseball bat.
Residents were forced to vacate the shelter, leaving it boarded with plywood and watched over by armed security. Building managers estimate that property damage amounts to more than $10,000, according to the county attorney’s office. Additional charges may be brought against others involved.
“This violent attack on some of our most vulnerable community members, unhoused women and children, in a place where they had gone to seek shelter and safety cannot be tolerated,” Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said in a statement.
Hoang Murphy, the CEO of People Serving People, which operates the shelter, said earlier this week that the four-hour episode was the culmination of an argument between shelter residents and neighbors over street parking that started days earlier and spilled over into violence.
According to the criminal complaint, which cites surveillance footage, Riser allegedly swung a baseball bat against the shelter’s doors, shattering glass while residents were inside. Another member of the group pointed what appears to be a gun at the front door of the building, the complaint says.
Residents have since been relocated to a hotel for safety reasons, costing People Serving People $9,000 a night — a figure that Murphy called unsustainable.
Star Tribune
6 months in jail for man shot by Minnesota deputies while resisting arrest
A man who was shot and wounded by sheriff’s deputies in east-central Minnesota while resisting arrest received a six-month jail term Friday.
Leo H. Hacker, 71, was sentenced in Pine County District Court in connection with his guilty plea in two cases of assault, and obstructing and fleeing law enforcement in connection with his clashes with deputies in February 2023.
Hacker’s sentences will be served concurrently and includes Judge Jason Steffen setting aside a three-year sentence sought by the County Attorney’s Office. Steffen’s terms also include five years’ probation and community work service.
According to the charges in each case and related court documents:
On Feb. 21, deputies tried to pull over Hacker’s pickup truck on a gravel road about a mile from his Pine City home. As two deputies approached his vehicle, he drove toward them. Both deputies opened fire on Hacker and wounded him.
Hacker was wanted at the time on charges of second-degree assault and obstructing law enforcement in connection with allegations that he pointed a gun at a deputy outside his home on Feb. 14 and angrily defied orders to drop the weapon.
At one point, Hacker warned the deputies that if they did not leave, he would return with “something bigger,” the charges quoted him as saying.
The deputy was there to seize Hacker’s SUV stemming from a dispute over his unpaid attorney fees, the charges read. However, law enforcement outside the home “determined that based on the totality of circumstances, it was in the interest of safety to leave the scene at that time” and instead seek a warrant for Hacker’s arrest, the criminal complaint continued.
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