Star Tribune
FBI arrests Minneapolis man, 59, linked to bombing, vandalizing salon over consecutive years
A 59-year-old Minneapolis man set off a bomb at a hair salon in the city in 2022 and returned a year later to lob a brick through its window, according to federal charges unsealed this week.
The FBI arrested Michael Allen Francisco on charges of using an explosive to “maliciously damage or destroy” a business after a multi-year investigation that included forensic analysis and an eventual alleged admission during a search of the man’s home March 28.
According to a sworn affidavit from a special agent assigned to the FBI’s joint terrorism task force, video footage from a Ring device showed a man allegedly identified as Francisco placing an explosive device on the window of the Studio 411 salon, 411 Cedar Lake Road S., and fleeing in a vehicle before it detonated at about 2:49 a.m. on Nov. 20, 2022.
Francisco was also identified in video footage recorded a year later in which he threw a landscaping brick through a window at the salon around 1:25 a.m. on Nov. 6, 2023.
Last week, on March 28, the FBI and Minneapolis police searched Francisco’s home and seized a black jacket suspected to be worn by Francisco during the rock-throwing incident. Agents also found multiple explosive components included suspected “energetic powders and fuses,” a .32 caliber Iver Johnson Cade revolver with ammunition, and suspected methamphetamine. Francisco has a prior federal bank robbery conviction from 2001 for which he was sentenced to 12 1/2 years in federal prison, thus making him prohibited from possessing a firearm.
In interviews with law enforcement during the search, Francisco later confessed both verbally and in writing to lighting the fuse on the explosive device that damaged Studio 411 and throwing the landscaping brick at the salon’s window a year later.
Francisco made a brief initial appearance in federal court in Minneapolis, in which he was ordered temporarily detained pending a detention and preliminary hearing next week. Francisco does not yet have an attorney assigned to represent him.
Analysts from the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) collected a mixture of DNA found on the rock tossed through the salon window last year and reported in January that Francisco could not be ruled out as a possible contributor.
The FBI reviewed police records and found that Francisco was linked to another case of possessing an explosive device: In March 2023, Minneapolis police found Francisco trespassing near an abandoned lumber yard in northeast Minneapolis. He left the area on foot but officers noticed a Ford F-150 pickup truck nearby running, unlocked and abandoned. Before towing the truck, they found an explosive device inside the center console area that the department’s bomb squad recovered and inventoried.
According to the complaint, fragments of the device found at Studio 411 included paper or cardboard material with a red, white and blue color pattern that matched the device found in the truck.
A jury found a longtime farmhand in southern Minnesota guilty in the killing of his boss, a man whose death prosecutors argued would bring the debt-ridden worker a “significant financial benefit.”
Travis Joel Bauer, 48, of Winthrop, was found guilty of second-degree murder by a jury in Sibley County District Court on Friday. The jury, after deliberating until 9 p.m., also found him not guilty of first-degree murder with premeditation.
Bauer was arrested last year in connection with the 2022 shooting of his boss, Dennis D. Weitzenkamp, 79.
Winthrop police found Weitzenkamp in his machine shed, slumped over to the left side of his body, with a bloody gunshot wound in the back of his head and no weapon within reach, court filings said. Weitzenkamp appeared to have been about to shuck an ear of corn, police said.
Bauer had helped Weitzenkamp “farm his land for many years and was considered part of the family,” a complaint against him read. Weitzenkamp was an Army veteran who served during the Vietnam War and moved to the Winthrop area in 1998, his online obituary said. He was survived by his wife of 37 years, five stepchildren, and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and enjoyed “watching sports, playing cards, bowling, traveling with family, driving trucks and wintering in Florida,” the obituary added.
Bauer told police that he never saw Weitzenkamp at the farm property after they left for separate lunch breaks. But law enforcement analysis of Bauer’s and Weitzenkamp’s cellphones showed they were both at the farm at the time of the killing. The cap and pants Bauer had on that day had gunshot residue on them, police said.
Law enforcement’s argued Bauer’s finances “had significant debt and was behind on bills,” and that he received calls that he could lose his home if he didn’t pay his debts an hour before Weitzenkamp was found dead. Trust documents disclosed to investigators that Bauer “would receive significant financial benefit” from Weitzenkamp’s death, prosecutors said.
Sibley County Attorney, Don Lannoye, said prosecutors were pleased at the verdict.
Roseville has joined the ranks of Minnesota cities with ordinances aimed at reducing the amount of Styrofoam and single-use plastic takeout containers in the trash.
On Monday, Roseville’s City Council unanimously passed a “Green To Go” ordinance, which requires takeout containers to be compostable, recyclable or reusable. Diners will likely see some changes when they pick up dinner.
“Any takeout food that they bring home from a restaurant, either if they’re getting takeout or if they’re bringing home leftovers from dining in, should be in something that they can put in the recycling bin, or it’s compostable,” said Noelle Bakken, the city’s sustainability specialist.
The city joins neighbors, including Minneapolis, St. Paul, St. Louis Park and Edina in enacting ordinances designed to make takeout containers more environmentally friendly.
The ordinance affects restaurants and food trucks, gas stations and convenience stores, grocery stores and schools. It does not affect hospitals and nursing homes, businesses with no retail food or beverage sales or caterers.
The ordinance includes utensils, though single-use straws may be available in dispensers or given to customers on request.
To-go container materials allowed under the ordinance include recyclable plastics (#1, #2, #5), metal and compostable plastic, paper or fiber products. No longer allowed are black plastic (including #5), Styrofoam and other plastics, including #4 and #6. Prepackaged foods and plastic films are exempt.
Bakken said the vote on the ordinance followed outreach with residents and businesses. Some businesses have been early adopters, and the city will help connect others to more sustainable packaging resources.
Star Tribune
Bloomington offers hopeful model for reducing police clashes with people in mental distress
For more than a quarter-century, James Ayers met with some of the most vulnerable residents in Minneapolis. As the former director of Walk-In Counseling Center, a free and anonymous counseling center on Chicago Avenue in Minneapolis that is staffed by volunteers, he witnessed the value of accessible mental health services.
“The tendency is to take a policing approach, to correct it without getting into what the hell is going on,” he told me.
It’s also why he and other counselors have praised a Bloomington police pilot program that aims to help residents gain access to counseling services when they call 911 during an emergency. The department has been nationally recognized after hiring two marriage and family therapists to help people address life challenges that may demand a mental health professional rather than a police officer.
“The whole idea is that people generally don’t deal with mental health issues until there is blood on the floor,” Ayers said. “And you can get ahead of the game by providing services as soon as possible when people are asking for it. The whole rationale for a walk-in counseling center is that you’ve gotta make it easy for people to talk. And that’s done by privacy, professionalism, timeliness. What’s going on in Bloomington is a good start.”
When I was a child, a relative of mine endured a mental health crisis outside our church. I was too young to understand the totality of mental health then, but I remember the moment when police arrived. One by one, they surrounded him. I was afraid. He wasn’t harmed but the possibility seemed real.
Every police department — and many have partnered with mental health organizations in recent years — should employ resources to address individuals facing mental health crises, as those situations can quickly deteriorate. Counselors and therapists, Bloomington’s program has shown, may help residents find solutions and avoid those encounters with police. They may also help families and individuals process their collective challenges before they matriculate and lead to violence and damage in their homes and communities.
The complexities and problems in policing here and elsewhere are well-documented. The model in Bloomington is one that could work throughout the Twin Cities, but only if patients’ privacy is protected and not improperly used by police. There is value in independent counseling services, but those services are not always attainable for those who need them most.
In Bloomington, more than 4,000 people are uninsured, according to the department, and the service gives those people access to therapists whom they might not see otherwise because of that barrier. To many, 911 is the universal number to call when there is a serious situation they can’t resolve on their own. That’s a habit we’ve all developed over time. Yet, a call to that number should not always start with a police response. If anything, the presence of counselors allows for nuance and patience in these scenarios, says the Minnesota Counseling Association, the local chapter of the American Counseling Association.
