Star Tribune
Armed North Branch woman fatally shot by police had struggled with mental illness, husband says
A woman who was shot to death by police last week in North Branch, Minn., had struggled with alcohol and mental illness, her husband said Saturday.
Jamie Ann Crabtree, 36, was killed Thursday night during an encounter with officers in a field near their home in the 38900 block of 3rd Avenue, Nicholas Williams told the Star Tribune.
North Branch police said Crabtree was armed with a handgun, intoxicated and suicidal when officers confronted her. One officer struck Crabtree with a nonlethal pepper ball before a second officer shot her with his firearm, according to police. She died at the scene.
As of Saturday morning, police had not said why the officers fired at the woman. Police Chief Dan Meyer said police-worn body cameras recorded the incident and that the officers have been put on administrative leave.
The state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension was leading the investigation into the shooting, which is standard practice, and is expected to reveal further details in the coming days.
Williams said he called 911 when his wife, after drinking heavily, left their home with a bottle of alcohol and a handgun in a case. He told an emergency dispatch operator that “suicide by cop” was among the comments she made at the time.
Williams said he followed his wife as she walked south toward Hwy. 95. When a police vehicle arrived, he said, he told the officer she had a gun.
“About three minutes later, there were a dozen shots,” he said.
Crabtree was shot while in a one-square-block open field north of the highway.
“I started to walk toward her in the field, but [officers] screamed at me to get back,” Williams said. “I said, ‘No, I’m the husband. She needs help.’ “
Even so, Williams said, he was kept away from his wounded wife.
He said officers repeatedly commanded Crabtree to roll away from the gun, even though she was “lifeless on the ground.” He said 17 minutes passed before any of the officers went to her aid.
“I believe the cops did the wrong thing” by waiting so long, said Williams, who took cellphone video of the more than 30 minutes that followed the shooting.
He said his wife suffered seizures when she drank and had been in therapy for mental illness.
“They knew she was mentally ill,” Williams said of the police. “They’ve picked her up five times over the past three years or so. … I was trying to be patient and help her out.”
Crabtree worked as a personal care attendant and “was on the phone with her favorite client when she got shot,” Williams said. “She was begging for help.”
Since 2000, police in Minnesota have killed at least 240 people, including nine this year and 11 in the past 11 months, according to a Star Tribune database.
Williams said the family “cycled though so many animals” in the home where they were raising two children, ages 11 and 6. He listed among them ducks, rabbits, cats, chickens, fish, a hamster and rats.
Sister-in-law Sarah Clifford, who started a GoFundMe page to help the family with expenses related to Crabtree’s death, posted that “she loved her family, her friends and had such a big heart for animals.”
Star Tribune staff writer Jeff Hargarten contributed to this report.
Two local men died last week as a result of crashes while riding their motorcycles, the State Patrol said.
Ross Anthony Stensrud, 61, of Rochester was killed Thursday evening when his motorcycle went off the highway south of St. Charles, Minn. According to the State Patrol, Stensrud was northbound on Hwy. 74 near Park Road when the accident happened shortly after 6 p.m.
The road was dry but alcohol was said to have been involved. Stensrud was not wearing a helmet.
Kaeden Devon Price, 19, of Minneapolis, died Tuesday of multiple blunt force injuries after crashing into a pickup truck on Interstate 35W on the afternoon of Sept. 24. The State Patrol said Price, who was wearing a helmet, was speeding on his motorcycle when he sideswiped one vehicle and rear-ended the pickup.
The accident happened near E. 36th Street in Minneapolis. No one else was hurt in the crash.
Minneapolis police are boosting patrols around synagogues and Jewish community centers during the ongoing High Holy Days, amid a global rise in anti-Semitic threats and violence.
“I am concerned with all the hateful rhetoric that is online,” Police Chief Brian O’Hara said Saturday at a City Hall news conference. “I am concerned that there could be a lone actor out there that could see something online and be inspired to commit an act of violence in our community.”
Already police have arrested a man on suspicion of making terroristic threats for reportedly carrying a gun outside Temple Israel in Minneapolis last week — and authorities say the 21-year-old had previously called in threats to shoot up the synagogue using a voice-masking app.
The man has not yet been charged for the incident which occurred during Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year that began at sundown Thursday. The holiest day of the Jewish calendar, Yom Kippur, starts Friday and ends Saturday.
O’Hara said that a gun has not been recovered and that police didn’t have evidence “to suggest that this incident was anti-Semitic in nature or motivated by hateful bias.” He said there were no ongoing direct threats to which the increased patrols are responding.
However, he said, “the police department has been seeing an enhanced level of threats towards our Jewish community over the last year,” and is especially mindful of the impending anniversary Monday of the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel by Hamas terrorists that killed nearly 1,200 people.
Mayor Jacob Frey, who is Jewish, said he was at Temple Israel with his wife during Rosh Hashanah.
“We all have an obligation here not just to act with peace, but to encourage peace from our neighbors, regardless of what happens around the world,” he said.
Star Tribune
Nine years after his murder, Barway Collins returns to a community that won’t forget him
Gary Hines, music director for the Grammy award-winning group Sounds of Blackness, played “Tears in Heaven” as the family sang. Barway’s sister Lulu, 2, babbled through the harmonies, saying “Hi” to her brother’s statue before hugging and kissing it.
For Hines, celebrating Collins’ life represents Sounds of Blackness’ mission to connect communities through music.
“I would hope that the unity in the community that we see right here, at this beautiful memorial event and service, would be sustained — would proliferate from community to the cities, state and nation,” he said.
Barway’s death has haunted Keith Demmings for years. The 61-year-old bus driver often thinks about what could have been done to prevent his death, and about what his son could learn from Barway’s life. Demmings said he hopes more adults will watch out for and care about youth in the community.
Barway “could have been a basketball player. He could have been a senator or something. He could have been the president of the United States, but we were robbed of that,” Demmings said. “I feel that our youth are being cheated. We can’t just brush it off, we need to be more involved … [in] raising our kids.”
