Star Tribune
$10K reward posted in hopes of finding driver who fatally struck doctor as she walked her dogs
Family members joined the Minnesota State Patrol and the Mille Lacs County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday to announce a $10,000 reward in hopes the money will lead to the discovery of the driver who hit and killed a longtime family doctor one month ago.
The hit-and-run crash occurred about 4:50 p.m. Nov. 13 on northbound Hwy. 169 about halfway between Vineland and Onamia near the southern shore of Lake Mille Lacs, while Cathy Ann Donovan, 56, and her dogs were out for a walk.
Donovan died at the scene. One of her dogs did not survive the crash; the other was not hurt, the Sheriff’s Office said.
Donovan was a doctor for the past 27 years in Onamia with Mille Lacs Health System, where she served as vice chief of staff for the health system and as medical director of its clinics.
“Mom was the best thing that ever happened to me,” Donovan’s 23-year-old son, Shan Donovan, said during a news conference in St. Paul announcing the reward.
“I started out my life [at] a little bit of a disadvantage,” he said, explaining that he was born in China with one arm, abandoned as a 1-year-old and placed in an orphanage with thousands of other kids.
“And then along came my mom,” he said. “She adopted me. She showed me what it was like to be loved, and accepted and what a family was.”
On the day he learned of his mother’s death, Shan Donovan revealed, he quit his job that night as a Fargo emergency medical technician and gave up his dream of working in health care beside his mother. He said the grief was more than he could bear.
“I’m struggling a lot right now,” he said at the one-month mark of his mother’s death.
Mille Lacs County Sheriff Kyle Burton said Donovan was well known in the community of 27,000, and served many through her practice, including himself.
“This has been a huge hit to our community, almost every single first responder that came to the scene personally knew her, so that was very difficult for them,” Burton said.
“I guess my ask for the community, as we move into the holidays,” the sheriff continued, “is somebody’s been keeping a secret since the 13th of November; somebody knows something, Dr. Donovan’s family is going to have to spend their first Christmas without her, and think about that as you spend time with your loved ones this Christmas season.”
Donovan’s father, George Donovan, attempted to read a statement before he was overcome with emotion.
“I’m having a hard time accepting the fact that Cathy is dead,” he said before her twin sister, Dr. Robin Councilman, took over reading his statement. “She’ll never be on the other end of the phone again, never at our weekly Zoom get togethers or family events.
“I cannot get my head around how anybody can drive off and leave someone in the road to die. I know Cathy cannot be replaced, but knowing why might help.”
In late November, the patrol released on social media a fuzzy image of the vehicle it has been looking for and described it as darker in color, either blue or metallic gray, with full-width taillights.
The patrol’s chief, Col. Matt Langer, followed Donovan’s son to the podium and said, “Someone out there knows something. … If it was you who was driving, and you were involved, the right thing to do is get this off your chest and come forward.”
Langer also directed his plea to anyone with an inkling of the driver responsible for Donovan’s death.
“So, if doing the right thing doesn’t motivate you, and money motivates you on top of it,” Langer continued, “thanks to the generosity of the family and others, there’s a $10,000 reward available if it puts us on the path to finding out who is responsible.”
The patrol said its contact on the case, Sgt. Jason Brown, who is standing by and can be reached at (218) 316-3026 or jason.brown@state.mn.us.
“Cathy lived a life of compassion and integrity,” Councilman said, “and we are asking that the public demonstrate that same compassion and integrity as we seek the person who killed her.”
Star Tribune staff writer Abby Simons contributed to this report.
Two people from Minnetonka were killed late Friday afternoon when their GMC Suburban ran a stop sign and was struck by a GMC Yukon headed north on Hwy. 169 west of Palisade, Minn.
According to the State Patrol, Marlo Dean Baldwin, 92, and Elizabeth Jane Baldwin, 61, were dead at the scene. The driver of the Suburban, a 61-year-old Minnetonka man, was taken to a hospital with life-threatening injuries.
The Suburban, pulling a trailer, was headed east on Grove Street/County Rd. 3 at about 5:15 p.m. when it failed to stop at Hwy. 169 and was struck by the northbound Yukon. The Yukon then struck two westbound vehicles stopped at the intersection.
Four people from Zimmerman, Minn., in the Yukon, including the driver, were taken to HCMC with life-threatening injuries, while two passengers were treated for non-life-threatening injuries. Three girls in the Yukon ranged in age from 11 to 15.
The drivers of the two vehicles struck by the Yukon were not injured, the State Patrol said. Road conditions were dry at the time of the accident, and alcohol was not believed to have been a factor. All involved in the accident were wearing a seat belt except for Elizabeth Baldwin.
Hill City police and the Aitkin County Sheriff’s Office assisted at the scene.
Amid the cacophony and chaos of the pregame preparation before a recent Minnetonka High School football game, an exceptional group of six girls is gathered together among the school’s deep and talented cheerleading and dance teams.
The cheerleaders, a national championship-winning program of 40 girls, dot the track around the football field. As the clock ticks down to kickoff and their night of choreographed routines begins, the six girls, proudly wearing Minnetonka blue T-shirts emblazoned with “Skippers Nation” and shaking shiny pom-poms, swirl around the track, bristling with excited energy.
Their circumstances are no different from any of the other cheerleaders with one notable exception: The girls on this team have special needs.
They’re members of the Minnetonka Sparklers, a squad of cheerleaders made up solely of girls with special needs.
A football game at Minnetonka High School is an elaborate production. The Skippers’ recent homecoming victory over Shakopee brought an announced crowd of 8,145. And that is just paying attendees; it doesn’t include school staffers, coaches, dance team, marching band, concession workers, media members and others going about their business attached to the game.
The Sparklers program, now in its 12th season, was the brainchild of Marcy Adams, a former Minnetonka cheerleader who initiated the program in her senior year of high school. Adams has been coach of the team since its inception, staying on through her tenure as a cheerleader at the University of Minnesota.
She started the program after experiencing the Unified Sports program at Minnetonka. The unified sports movement at high schools brings together student-athletes with cognitive or physical disabilities and athletes with no disabilities to foster relationships, understanding and compassion through athletics. Many Minnesota schools offer unified sports.
“I grew up in a household that valued students with special needs and valued inclusion,” Adams said. “I saw a need to give to those students. At Minnetonka, we have a strong Unified program, and this was a great opportunity to build relationships and offer mentorship opportunities.”
Elite runners are in a league of their own.
To get a sense of how far ahead elite runners are compared to the rest of us, the Minnesota Star Tribune took a look at how their times compare to the average marathon participant.
The 2022 Twin Cities Marathon men’s winner was Japanese competitor Yuya Yoshida, who ran the marathon in a time of 2 hours, 11 minutes and 28 seconds, for an average speed of 11.96 mph. He averaged 5 minutes and 2 seconds per mile.
That’s more than twice the speed of the average competitor across both the men’s and women’s categories, of 5.89 mph, according to race results site Mtec. The average participant finished in 4 hours, 26 minutes and 56 seconds. That comes out to an average time of 10 minutes and 11 seconds per mile.
And taking it to the most extreme, the fastest-ever marathon runner, Kelvin Kiptum of Kenya, finished the 2023 Chicago Marathon in 2 hours and 35 seconds, for an average pace of about 13 mph. Kiptum averaged 4 minutes and 36 seconds per mile.
Here is a graphic showing these differences in average marathon speed.
