Star Tribune
After 2 fights, no classes Friday at St. Louis Park High School
Classes and on-campus activities have been called off Friday at St. Louis Park High School after two separate fights involving students and adults at the school on Thursday.
Two adults were arrested and some students and school staff members sustained minor injuries during the skirmishes that broke out at the end of the school day Thursday, a statement on the school district’s website says.
The first fight was between two groups of students. Teachers and staff intervened. But the situation escalated when adults who do not work at the high school and knew of the earlier incident got involved in a physical altercation with the students, the school district said.
Police and school staff were able to break up the fight.
It was not immediately clear what led to the fights, and district officials and police will use Friday to investigate and prepare for classes to resume next week.
“As of now, there is no confirmation about the involvement of weapons in either altercation,” the district’s statement said. “We are actively gathering information and working closely with law enforcement to understand the full scope of these incidents, including whether or not the incidents were racially motivated.”
Along with classes, all athletic practices and a home girl’s basketball game against rival Benilde-St. Margaret’s have been canceled. The building will be closed to students, families and the public, the announcement said.
District officials said more information will be shared with families as they learn more about what happened on Thursday. They also said additional layers of security will be in place when classes resume next week.
All other schools in the west metro school district will be held Friday as usual, the statement said.
The trial included testimony from a Towson University marketing professor who conducted a survey about the advertisements.
The pictures are actually tightly controlled by contracts negotiated between the models and the magazines, said Chamberlin, a modelling agent who testified during the trial. A 30-year veteran of the industry who has represented Brooke Shields, Tyra Banks, Claudia Schiffer and others, Chamberlin during his testimony pulled back the curtain on the high-stakes negotiations that take place for supermodels, saying none of the images that the Cajun Club used were intended for strip club advertisements.
“We know exactly what they’ll be shooting, what product, and what type of work, and then we know how that’s going to be distributed and any other questions. It’s all negotiated before the model sets foot onto the set,” he testified.
Even if the women had consented to the use of the photographs in Cajun Club advertisements, Chamberlin said, it would have cost the club more than $1.2 million in fees.
The jury ruled in favor of the women and said they were owed amounts ranging from $1,500 to $15,000.
A freeway ramp in downtown Minneapolis used by thousands of drivers each day closed Monday morning and won’t reopen for five weeks.
Minnesota Department of Transportation crews shut down the ramp from northbound I-35W to eastbound I-94 at 5 a.m. Monday and it won’t reopen until Nov. 29
In addition, both directions of I-94 will be reduced to two lanes between 11th Avenue S. and Franklin Avenue.
The closures will allow crews to construct crossovers that motorists will use in 2025 when MnDOT begins maintenance work on five bridges along I-94 between downtown Minneapolis and the Franklin Avenue bridge that crosses I-94.
Drivers needing to get from northbound I-35W to eastbound I-94 will be directed to go north on I-35W to Hwy. 36 and south on I-35E.
Next year, both directions of I-94 will be reduced to two lanes between Hwy. 55/Hiawatha Avenue and the Franklin Avenue bridge.
The preference, he said, was to arrest Sawchak outside, but “in this case, this suspect is a recluse and does not come out of the house.”
City Council members criticized MPD for their handling of the case, expressing outrage at the department’s inability to protect a resident “from a clear, persistent and amply reported threat posed by his neighbor.”
The Moturis have reported to police at least 19 incidents of vandalism, property destruction, theft, harassment, hate speech and other verbal threats, including threats of assault, involving Sawchak since last fall — shorty after the couple moved in. Sawchak is white and Moturi is Black.
Over the weekend, as frustration continued to boil over about the lack of a resolution in the case, several more council members released statements demanding that MPD move in to make an arrest.
“Our Chief of Police is hiding behind excuses, and our Mayor…is just hiding,” Council Member Emily Koski wrote on X.
Less than two hours later, from the scene of an unrelated fatal shooting at a homeless encampment, O’Hara acknowledged that his police force failed to protect Moturi and issued an apology.
