Kare11
St. Paul ’88 cold case victim’s daughter pleads for information
At 4 years old, Katelin Prokop witnessed her mom snatched from her bed before she was killed. Now, she hopes a $10,000 reward will make people talk.
SAINT PAUL, Minn. — Katelin Prokop’s memories of her mom play in her head like a slideshow.
“We were really close. We were always together. I don’t ever remember being apart from her,” Katelin said.
They’re like still images, including memories from the night her mom was killed.
“There’s memory of them being there, trying to face away from me. Then there’s memory of her not being in the bed,” Katelin said.
Katelin was 4 years old, living with her 23-year-old mother Cheryl Prokop, known as Cherie, on Saint Paul’s west side.
On Dec. 2, 1988, someone came into the bedroom where they both were sleeping, took Cherie out of the room, and then beat and strangled her to death. Katelin waited for it to be quiet enough to safely get out of the bed. Then, she found her mom.
“I remember her laying there. And I remember blood coming out of her mouth so I took a washcloth and I cleaned that,” Kaitlin said. “I remember getting dressed and knocking on doors until I found someone who was awake and who would answer.”
A 1991 KARE 11 report demonstrated the police theory of the crime: When police arrived, a basement window was broken out as though someone had entered through the laundry room — someone unknown to the victim. But, they later came to believe that all this was done to make it appear as if the assailant was a stranger.
Staging a break-in, police thought, as the killer and an accomplice then actually went through the front door. Police thought they knew who.
“With method, motive and opportunity, the shadow falls on one person,” said the late Lt. Bill Gillespie, St. Paul Police homicide detective, in 1991.
But police didn’t have enough evidence to make an arrest.
“I know that it’s somebody that knew her,” Katelin said.
It was too risky, police thought back then, to ask young Katelin to testify.
“A 4- or 5- or 6-year-old child on the stand, it wouldn’t take a very accomplished trial lawyer to raise an element of doubt in front of a jury,” Gillespie said.
Now at age 39, Katelin hopes for a chance to testify and help put her mom’s killers away.
“I definitely would. I don’t think there’s anything I would want more than to help do that for her. And for my family,” she said.
Katelin’s family life, after Cherie was killed, completely changed. Katelin’s aunts became her sisters. Her grandma and grandpa became her parents. Dick and Joan Prokop are still living, nearing 80 years old. And Katelin says they deserve some kind of peace before they’re gone.
“They’ve definitely been the backbone of our family. They’re the main reason that I want this so much,” she said.
And what does she mean by “this?”
“Justice,” Kaitlin said. “To know who did it and to know why.”
The reward is being offered to anyone with information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons who murdered Prokop. If you know something, contact the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) at 877-996-6222, contact the agency via email or through its “See it Say it Send it” tip app.
Tipsters can remain anonymous.
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Kare11
Aitkin County crash leaves 2 dead, others hurt
The crash happened when a Suburban pulling a trailer failed to stop at a stop sign, Minnesota State Patrol said.
WAUKENABO, Minn. — Two people from Minnetonka died in a crash Friday in Aitkin County while others, including children, were hurt.
According to Minnesota State Patrol, it happened at the intersection of Highway 169 and Grove Street/County Road 3 in Waukenabo Township at approximately 5:15 p.m.
A Suburban pulling a trailer was driving east on County Road 3 but did not stop at the stop sign at Highway 169, authorities said. The vehicle was struck by a northbound GMC Yukon. Two other vehicles were struck in the crash, but the people in those two cars were not injured.
In the Suburban, the driver sustained life-threatening injuries, according to State Patrol. Elizabeth Jane Baldwin, 61, of Minnetonka, and Marlo Dean Baldwin, 92, of Minnetonka, both died. Officials said the driver of the vehicle, a 61-year-old from Minnetonka, has life-threatening injuries.
There were six people in the Yukon when the crash occurred. The 44-year-old driver, as well as passengers ages 18, 14, and 11, sustained what officials described as life-threatening injuries. The other two passengers have non-life-threatening injuries.
Alcohol is not believed to be a factor in the crash, but officials said Elizabeth Jane Baldwin had not been wearing a seatbelt.
Kare11
Runner shares his journey with addiction ahead of Twin Cities Marathon
Among those at the start line this year will be Alex Vigil.
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Kare11
Minnesotan behind ‘Inside Out 2’ helps kids name ‘hard emotions’
Pixar’s second installment of the movie features characters we’ve already met — Joy, Sadness and Anger — and gives them a new roommate named Anxiety.
MINNEAPOLIS — Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” universe plays out inside the mind of the movie’s adolescent protagonist, Riley.
She plays a kid from Minnesota whose family uproots her life by moving to San Francisco. But did you know that what plays out in Riley’s mind actually comes from the mind of a real-life Minnesotan?
“You are one of us!” said Breaking the News anchor Jana Shortal.
“Yes, I am!” said Burnsville native and the movie’s creator and director, Kelsey Mann.
Mann was chosen for the role by ANOTHER Minnesotan — Pete Docter, the man behind the original movie, “Inside Out.”
“I don’t know if Pete asked me to do this movie because I was from Minnesota and he was from Minnesota … I just think it worked out that way,” Mann said.
How two guys from the south metro made a pair of Pixar movies that would change the game is a hell of a story that began with Docter in 2015.
“He [Docter] was just trying to tell a fun story — an emotional, fun story — and didn’t realize how much it would help give kids a vocabulary to talk about things they were feeling because they are feeling those emotions, but they’re really hard to talk about,” Mann said.
Some parents, counselors and teachers might even tell you it did more good for kids than just entertain them. It unlocked their emotions and begged for what Mann set out to create at the beginning of 2020.
“That part was fun, particularly fun,” he said. “I think the daunting part was following up a film that everyone really loved.”
But Mann knew what he wanted to do with the movie’s follow-up, “Inside Out 2.”
“Diving into Riley’s adolescence … that was just fun,” he said.
This time around, Riley is 13, hitting puberty and facing all of what, and who, comes with it. The franchise’s second installment features characters we’ve already met — Joy, Sadness and Anger — and gives them a new roommate named Anxiety.
“I think that’s what’s fun about the ‘Inside Out’ world: You can take something we all know and give it a face,” Mann said. “We can give anxiety a name and a face.”
The film follows Riley’s emotions fighting it out for control of her life. Joy wants Riley to stay young and hold on only to joy, while anxiety is hell-bent on taking over Riley over at the age of 13 because as a lot of us know, that’s when anxiety often moves in.
“I always pitched it as a takeover movie, like an emotional takeover,” Mann said. “Anxiety can kind of feel like that; it can take over and kind of shove your other emotions to the side and repress them.”
For a kids’ movie, it’s hard to watch this animation play out, even when an adult has the keys to decide.
“I’m making a movie about anxiety and I still have to remind myself to have my anxiety take a seat,” Mann said.
All of our individual anxieties have a place in this world.
“The whole movie honestly is about acceptance. Both acceptance of anxiety being there and also of your own flaws,” said Mann.
Even for our kids, we have to remember that this is life.
Anxiety will come for them; it does for us all.
The “Inside Out” world just shows them it’s so.