Star Tribune
On eve of sentencing, beliefs of Twin Cities man who discussed killing cops are under microscope
Federal prosecutors are urging a judge this week to elevate the sentence of a young Twin Cities man caught buying illegal machine gun conversion devices from an FBI informant, arguing that his extremist ideologies and interest in deadly armed conflicts with police warrant a decade in prison.
River William Smith, arrested in December 2022, pled guilty last year to buying the gun parts from an undercover FBI informant, bringing to a close an investigation that followed reports of concerning behavior at a shooting range. Smith last year made a straight plea to one charge of illegally possessing a machine gun. Now, his attorney is calling for an 18-month prison sentence, instead describing his client as a non-violent video game enthusiast who took an FBI informant’s bait.
Smith was arrested peacefully after purchasing two machine gun conversion devices, or switches, and three inert hand grenades from one of two undercover informants helping investigate him in 2022. He was wearing soft armor and possessed a loaded Glock handgun and agents recovered from his vehicle an assault-style rifle and nearly 1,000 rounds of ammunition.
Prosecutors and federal agents have raised alarms about statements from Smith, 21, of Savage, supporting Nazi paramilitary groups and mass killings of law enforcement, the LGBTQ community and Muslims. He often spoke of waging a deadly gun battle with law enforcement and dubbed as a “hero” the perpetrator of a deadly attack on a Colorado LGBTQ night club, according to court records.
“Ultimately, the defendant is a heavily armed, angry, socially isolated, and bullied marksman who harbors a grievance against law enforcement, racial and religious minorities, members of the LGBTQ community, and virtually anyone who does not fit in with his vision of society,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Winter wrote last week in a memo supporting his case for a 10-year elevated sentence. “The defendant presents a unique danger to the community and the sentence imposed in this case should reflect this reality.”
Smith first landed on law enforcement’s radar at age 17 in 2019, when he discharged an AK-47 in the home he shared with his grandparents in the south metro suburbs. His grandmother was injured when she cut her hand on a doorknob that had been rendered shrapnel by the shooting, according to court records and testimony. Police found several handguns, a rifle, shotgun, magazines, tactical equipment and ammunition during a search of the home. And law enforcement found searches on his electronic devices relating to Hitler and Nazis, bomb-making and videos of gay people being killed.
Smith’s attorney, Jordan Kushner, is calling Winter’s request for a 10-year sentence “outrageous.” Smith had never committed an act of violence or harmed anyone, Kushner said, and instead was more interested in recreating “action that he viewed on video games.” In court on Wednesday, Kushner said he never followed through on violent statements, and noted that it was not illegal to research any of the topics that appeared in his web search history.
“The government’s dislike for Mr. Smith’s ideologies (some of which he has renounced), his interests and fantasies, and the fact that he does not like the government, are inappropriate considerations for sentencing,” Kushner wrote in his own memo to Senior U.S. District Judge David Doty.
Doty is scheduled to sentence Smith on Thursday in Minneapolis. On Wednesday, he took testimony from witnesses that included a senior FBI behavioral profiler during an evidentiary hearing requested by the government.
Smith, who’s been held at the Sherburne County Jail since his arrest, appeared in an orange sweatsuit. Seated in the back of the courtroom behind him was a row of family and supporters who waved and blew kisses.
Winter cited recorded jail calls between August 2023 and October 2023 as evidence that Smith still poses a danger. During one call, he told his mother that if he had to serve 10 years in prison, “they have my word that I won’t leave this country. It’ll be settled right here.”
A month later, speaking to his grandmother: “give me seven years and I promise you, you’ll find out why I did what I did to go to the range that much and why I took that so seriously. Cause it’s the one skill that helps deal with little [expletives] like that.”
FBI Special Agent Erinn Tobin, the lead case agent investigating Smith, further testified Wednesday that she reviewed 300 of some 4,900 calls made from jail since his Dec. 2022 arrest. During one call back home to family, Tobin testified, Smith “said he just wanted sentencing to be over so he could ‘focus on the warpath.'”
Rain and potentially heavy snow are on tap Thursday around the Twin Cities, just before families set out for Halloween trick-or-treating.
Temperatures were expected to drop throughout the day, creating conditions for flurries. A winter weather advisory is in effect from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. covering the Twin Cities metro area and parts of south-central Minnesota. Steady rain drenched the Twin Cities on Thursday, making for a soggy morning commute.
“As colder air begins to move in this morning, the rain will transition to heavy snow from west to east with snowfall rates of an inch per hour at times into early afternoon,” the National Weather Service in Chanhassen said in a weather advisory.
The Twin Cities and surrounding areas could get between 2 and 4 inches of snow, according to the weather service. The winter weather advisory is expected to affect Anoka, Chisago, Hennepin, Ramsey, Scott, Washington and Le Sueur counties.
It’s unclear how much of the snow will actually stick, with warm surface temperatures likely leading to melting on contact in many areas.
“Exact totals will depend on snowfall rate, surface temperatures, and melting — which increases uncertainty with the snow forecast,” the weather service said in an early Thursday briefing.
“Thundersnow possible!” the weather service emphasized.
The good news for Halloween revelers is that the snow and rain are expected to wrap up in time for trick-or-treating, though temperatures will remain in the 30s with a sharp windchill.
An off-duty Washington County sheriff’s deputy caused a head-on crash while under the influence of alcohol and injured a couple in the other vehicle, officials said.
The crash occurred about 10:40 a.m. Sunday in Afton on Hwy. 95 at Scenic Lane, the Minnesota State Patrol said.
Campbell Johnston Blair, 58, of Hastings, was heading north in his Subaru Crosstrek, crossed into the opposite lane and collided with a southbound Ford Expedition, the patrol said.
Blair and the other vehicle’s occupants, 38-year-old Erik Robert Sward and 36-year-old Heather Lynn Sward, both of Lake Elmo, were taken to Regions Hospital with non-critical injuries, according to the patrol.
The patrol noted the alcohol use by Blair was involved in the crash.
Blair, who was driving a private vehicle at the time of the crash while off-duty, has been a deputy with the Sheriff’s Office since 2020 and is currently assigned to our Court Security Unit.
The Sheriff’s Office has been asked for reaction to the crash involving one of its deputies.
ST. CLOUD – On Tuesday, St. Cloud voters will be asked to make decisions on a new fire station and moving city elections to odd years, and — for those who live in Stearns County — how to fund a new county jail.
Here’s a look at the three referendum questions that are on St. Cloud-area ballots this year.
Ballot question: “Shall Stearns County be authorized to impose a sales tax & use tax of three-eighths of one percent to finance up to $325 million, plus associated bonding costs, for the construction of a justice center facility, consisting of law enforcement, judicial center and jail? The sales tax would be used solely to finance construction, upgrades and financing costs for the justice center and remain in effect for 30 years or until the project is paid for, whichever comes first. These services and facilities are mandated by the state of Minnesota to be provided by counties.”
Stearns County officials are planning to build a new $325 million justice center complex that includes a 270-bed jail, a judicial center with courtrooms, and a law enforcement center that houses the Sheriff’s Office. In the summer, Stearns County board members voted to move those facilities out of downtown and to a new location with more space. That site has yet to be determined.
The question before voters is how to fund that center.
County Administrator Mike Williams said a common misconception he’s heard at recent town halls is residents think voting “yes” gives permission to the county to build the facility, and if they vote “no,” the county won’t spend the money to build it.
“People [think they] are voting on the project — and they’re not. They’re voting on how we are going to fund it,” Williams said.
If voters approve the ballot question, the county will impose a sales tax to fund the project. If they vote it down, the county can instead pay for the project with property taxes.