A St. Paul woman was taking chocolate chip cookies out of the oven when her two adult sons got into a confrontation in the kitchen. Seconds later, Justin Girling allegedly pulled out a small black handgun and fired a shot at his half-brother.

The woman told police her elder son, Kurt Schmeck, was trying to get back on his feet after being knocked down by the initial shot when Girling fired twice more, according to legal documents.

Medics who responded to the house pronounced him dead at the scene.

A medical examiner later determined the 47-year-old bled to death from gunshots to his chest, neck and lower back.

Girling, 32, was charged Friday with one count of second-degree intentional murder in his death.

The men’s mother called police around 1:40 p.m. Wednesday to report the shooting inside their home on the 1000 block of Third Street East.

She was talking to the 911 operator when Girling grabbed the phone and said he just shot his brother in self-defense, the complaint said.

When the operator asked what had prompted his actions, Girling reportedly said he didn’t want to go into details.

“I’m not going to say anything more. Um, I came down to confront him. Um, and then he came … toward me — challenged me — and I shot him in self-defense. That’s all I’m going to say,” Girling responded, according to legal documents.

The operator then overheard their mother asking in the background, ‘Why’d you do it three times, Justin,’” the complaint said.

Police arrived at the scene to find Schmeck lying on his back bleeding. The house smelled of freshly baked cookies.

Girling told officers where he put the gun and was arrested. He declined an interview with investigators.

Officers saw no signs of a struggle in the house and found no injuries to Girling, the complaint said.

The men’s mother told police that the three of them lived in the Dayton’s Bluff home and that her children hated each other.

She said she was making cookies that afternoon when Schmeck came upstairs and told her he was going to the store for chickpeas after complaining to his mother that he didn’t like the way the cookies had turned out, court documents say.

He had just returned and was telling his mother about inadequate service he received at the store when Girling came downstairs and asked what was going on, the complaint said.

Schmeck started saying something to Girling and walked toward him, the mother told police.

That’s when Girling pulled out his gun and fired, the complaint said.

The men’s mother was on the phone at the time of the incident and police also interviewed the caller.

That man told police he overheard the brothers arguing because one was mad that the other had been woken up, legal documents say.

“What are you going to do about it, tough guy,” the man told officers he overheard one of them say.

Then he heard a crash followed by “call the police” before the line went dead, the complaint said.

Girling has a permit to carry a firearm in Ramsey County, authorities say.

He has no criminal record in Minnesota.

No attorney was listed for him in court records and a family member declined to comment.

Girling is scheduled to make his first court appearance on the allegations this afternoon.

St. Paul City Council member Dai Thao faces criminal charges for allegedly taking an elderly woman to a polling place in November and helping her cast her ballot, authorities say.

Thao, who was running for mayor of St. Paul at the time, was charged Tuesday with unlawfully marking a ballot, misconduct in or near polling places, and unlawful assistance of a voter, according to the criminal complaint filed against him in Ramsey County District Court.

The first charge is a gross misdemeanor. The other two are petty misdemeanors.

Thao’s attorney said the council member was only trying to help a disabled senior get to the polls and that is not against state law.

The charges stem from allegations made against Thao by an election judge working at the Martin Luther King Recreation Center on Nov. 6, charges say.

The election judge said he witnessed as Thao entered a voting booth with a voter and then appeared to help the voter fill out her ballot, according to the criminal complaint.

St. Paul police took a report from Ramsey County elections manager Joe Mansky about the incident. The case was investigated by the Hennepin County sheriff’s office to avoid any conflict of interest. The Dakota County attorney’s office reviewed the case and determined it warranted criminal charges.

During the 2017 election season, the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension investigated allegations that Thao had solicited a bribe from a food container company and lobbyist Sarah Clarke, wife of then-Minneapolis mayoral candidate Jacob Frey.

Noting no money had changed hands, the Scott County attorney’s office declined to press charges.

VOTER RECOUNTS EVENTS TO INVESTIGATORS

Hennepin County investigators were able to track down the voter, who told authorities she had been outside her home when she and others were approached by a person she knew as “Mr. Xiong,” court documents say.

Law enforcement has since determined Mr. Xiong was in fact Thao, the complaint said. Thao then asked the group if they were planning to vote and offered to help.

The voter — who said she did not speak English, had poor vision and had never voted before — accepted Thao’s offer. Thao then gave her a ride to the Martin Luther King Recreation Center polling location, according to legal documents.

Once there, Thao helped her register to vote and then accompanied her into the booth. Thao then read her each candidate’s name and helped her mark the ballot because “she had difficulty seeing the circles,” the complaint said.

The voter added that despite his assistance, Thao never told her whom to vote for, according to authorities.

She also said she didn’t realize at the time that Thao was a candidate for mayor.

THERE ARE RULES FOR HELPING A VOTER

State election law says voters needing assistance due to an “inability to read English or physical inability to mark a ballot” can bring “a family member, friend, neighbor or anyone you choose to help you vote.”

The only exception is that you can’t get help from your employer, your union or a candidate for office, the law says.

David Schultz, a professor of political science at Hamline University and legal professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, called the Thao case unusual, as elected officials usually know better than to enter polling locations.

“I don’t recall a single situation in Minnesota where you’ve had a candidate for office charged for doing something like that,” Schultz said.

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: THAO’S HELP NOT ILLEGAL

In a subsequent interview with investigators, Thao admitted to the allegations, the complaint said.

His attorney, Joe Dixon, said in a written statement Tuesday that while Thao acknowledges he helped someone vote, his actions were not in violation of the law.

“The conduct of which Mr. Thao now stands accused is perfectly legal for virtually everyone in Minnesota. There is no allegation that Mr. Thao did anything intentionally wrong, or that he did anything wrong other than help one elderly woman overcome disabilities so that she could vote,” the statement read.

The statement goes on to say the suggestion by authorities that Thao represented himself under a different name at the time was incorrect.

Thao called the charges unfair in the same statement.

“When Ms. Yang told me she wanted to vote but had no one to take her, I drove her to the polls. When we got there and she asked for my help because no one else spoke Hmong and she couldn’t see well or hold a pen, I couldn’t say no,” his statement read. “I do not deny helping my disabled neighbor, and I believe the charges are really unfair.”

PROSECUTOR: INTENTIONS ARE MOOT

Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom said Thao’s good intentions are moot when determining the legality of his actions.

Filing these kinds of charges against political candidates is rare, Backstrom said, adding that Dakota County has never done so in his roughly 40 years as county attorney.

A representative from the state court system said no one has been charged under the statutes since as far back as Minnesota has been keeping electronic records.

A conviction on the misdemeanors would not provide legal ground to dismiss Thao from his city council seat, Backstrom said.

Thao’s first appearance on the charges is scheduled for March 6.

Thao lost the mayoral election to Melvin Carter, garnering about 12 percent of the vote.

Staff reporter Frederick Melo contributed to this report.

READ THE COMPLAINT

Tears and hugs broke out in a Ramsey County courtroom Tuesday after a jury returned a guilty verdict against the St. Paul man accused of fatally shooting Carlos Rogers outside a bar on Rice Street last summer.

Despite his defense attorney’s attempts to convince them that the state had pinned the death on the wrong man, the jury found Justin Darrell Reynolds guilty of one count of intentional second-degree murder following 15 hours of deliberation.

Rogers’ family and friends cried and hugged one another after the verdicts were read. One woman jubilantly declared, “God is good” as she exited the courtroom.

Rogers’ mother, Kamesha Coleman, declined to comment other than to thank the Ramsey County attorney’s office for its handling of the case.

Reynolds’ attorney, Michael Padden, said he and his co-counsel, Karlowba Adams Powell, plan to appeal the verdict.

“We are very disappointed and we feel he is innocent,” Padden said.

Reynolds displayed little emotion as the verdict was read and was quickly ushered out of the courtroom after District Judge Judith Tilsen scheduled his sentencing date for this spring.

Reynolds, 29, and another man — Charles Eugene Frye — were charged in the case about a month after Rogers was fatally shot outdoor Born’s Bar in the 800 block of Rice Street around 1:30 a.m. June 11.

Rogers, a 28-year-old father, reportedly got into a dispute with one of the bouncers at the bar around that time and was kicked out of the establishment. He was accompanied by a woman who later told police that Rogers was like an uncle to her.

Frye, Reynolds and another woman were standing outside the bar when Rogers and the other woman were escorted outside, authorities say.

A dispute ensued between the parties and at some point Frye punched Rogers, according to trial testimony. Then a shot was fired and Rogers eventually went down. Reynolds and Frye fled the scene shortly afterward.

Padden argued at trial that it was Frye who had fired the shot, not Reynolds.

In November, the state dropped the murder charges pending against Frye, citing “recent developments regarding a key witness.”

Assistant Ramsey County Attorney Dawn Bakst argued at trial that video footage obtained from the bar’s surveillance system and eyewitness testimony clearly indicated Reynolds was the shooter.

“You know that (Reynolds) pulled the trigger and that (Frye) did not,” Bakst told the jury during her closing arguments in the case. “Maybe without thinking. Maybe without planning … the defendant grabbed a gun and shot Mr. Rogers at close range.”

The video of the incident was played multiple times during the trial. The footage was grainy and the people depicted in it difficult to see.

The jury asked for it to be played twice more during deliberations.

Reynolds is scheduled to be sentenced April 4.

Reynolds’ previous convictions include terroristic threats, second-degree assault and domestic assault.

Rogers had been released from prison about a week and a half before he was killed and had been focusing on stabilizing his life and caring for his children, his cousin said shortly after his death.

A week before a Vadnais Heights City Council member was to be sentenced in a case involving allegations of domestic violence against a woman he was seeing, Terry Nyblom called his now ex and asked her why she was doing this to him, authorities say.

The phone call allegedly violated an order for protection the woman had gotten from a court against Nyblom following the incident, prompting a second criminal charge to be filed against the 54-year-old.

He was charged with one count of violating a no-contact order Jan. 30, according to the criminal complaint filed against him in Ramsey County District Court.

Nyblom reached a deal with the state in the case and pleaded guilty to only a disorderly conduct charge. The rest of the charges were dismissed.

Ramsey County District Judge DeAnne Hilgers sentenced him to 40 hours of community service and ordered that he attend domestic violence counseling and continue to have no contact with the victim, according to court records.

He also received a stayed 90-day prison sentence that will he will have to serve only if he fails to meet the other terms of his probation.

Neither Nyblom’s defense attorney, Beau McGraw, nor Nyblom responded to requests for comment.

But Nyblom denied many of the allegations in the complaint shortly after he entered his guilty plea to the disorderly conduct count in November.

“I did not restrict her 911 call, I did not assault her, I did not threaten to hurt her nor did I ever make reference that the Sheriff won’t do anything to me because I’m a city council member,” he wrote in an email sent at the time.

Nyblom was taken into custody at his Vadnais Heights home in April after quarreling with a 53-year-old St. Paul woman in his house and trying to prevent her from placing a 911 call, according to the Ramsey County sheriff’s office.

Deputies responded to the residence on the 700 block of Hiawatha Avenue in response to a 911 caller.

They found the caller “crying, visibly shaking and (having) a hard time speaking because she was so upset,” according to an incident report. The woman stated that she was “involved in a romantic/sexual relationship with Terry Nyblom.”

She went on to tell deputies that Nyblom was “extremely intoxicated” and had been yelling at her to leave the house, according to the report. She said he also threatened her and threatened that she couldn’t do anything about his conduct because he was a city council member, the woman told authorities, according to court documents.

The woman also allegedly reported that Nyblom became physically combative.

A deputy who responded to the scene described Nyblom as appearing drunk at the time, according to the police report. Nyblom “admitted to consuming a six-pack but denied that anything physical happened” with the woman, the report said.

The victim in the case did not attend Nyblom’s sentencing hearing, according to Martin Norder, the attorney handling the case for the state.

Norder declined to comment on why the state offered Nyblom a plea deal.

The victim told police that Nyblom called her in violation of her no-contact order around 11:30 p.m. Jan. 27 asking her “why she would do this to him,” the complaint said.

When the woman reminded him he wasn’t supposed to contact her, he replied: “Well, I’m going to jail,” the complaint said.

He texted her two more times after she hung up on him, the woman told police, charges say.

While he remains a city council member, Nyblom was removed from his position as deputy mayor following the allegations.

The father of two was first elected to the Vadnais Heights City Council in 2012 and was re-elected to the seat in 2015.

He is an auto technician, according to his biography  on the city’s website.

Steve Nasseff is still shaken by what happened to his ailing uncle by someone who was trusted to take care of him last year.

It started shortly after the family of John Nasseff — a retired senior West Publishing executive and one of St. Paul’s most prolific donors — hired someone to help care for the 94-year-old after he suffered a stroke in 2016, Steve Nasseff said.

At the recommendation of a family friend who ran a business that provided in-home care for seniors, they ended up bringing in Nicholas Aaron Lofquist-Sprangel for the job in October of that year.

The 23-year-old Andover man was tasked with looking after John Nasseff overnight at the downtown St. Paul condo he shares with his wife while Steve Nasseff kept watch during the day. His stroke impacts John Nasseff’s mobility and balance, so he needs help getting in and out of bed and moving around his residence, his family said.

Months after Lofquist-Sprangel was hired, the family noticed some of John Nasseff’s valuables were missing.

At first, Steve Nasseff chalked it up to misplaced belongings. But as more disappeared — rings, cufflinks, watches, cash, loose diamonds — he knew something was amiss, he said Wednesday afternoon.

“It just got to the point where I couldn’t ignore the situation any longer,” Nasseff said.

He set up a hidden camera in John Nasseff’s residence, and two hours later, the mystery was solved, according to authorities.

“I watched (Lofquist-Sprangel) going through my uncle’s drawers,” Steve Nasseff said.

Footage collected over the next couple of days showed him pocketing more valuables, including 25 $100 bills that the family strategically placed in a spot John Nasseff typically keeps his cash to bait the burglar, court documents say.

In total, Nasseff’s former caretaker is accused of taking nearly $1.4 million in valuables, authorities say.

Lofquist-Sprangel was charged in October 2017 with one count of felony-level theft for his conduct, according to the criminal complaint filed against him Ramsey County District Court.

He pleaded guilty to the charge Jan. 30 and is expected to be sentenced in April. His attorney, John Leunig, could not be immediately reached for comment Wednesday.

A few days after installing the hidden camera, Steve Nasseff reported the theft to police. They stopped Lofquist-Sprangel on the way back to his car after leaving John Nasseff’s home Sept. 6, court documents say.

When asked if he had any items that didn’t belong to him, Lofquist-Sprangel admitted he was carrying cash and a gold chain that weren’t his, the complaint said. He told police he had other stolen items stashed in a safe at his Andover home.

Police accompanied him there and recovered much of John Nasseff’s stolen jewelry, including watches, rings, earrings, necklaces and loose diamonds, according to court documents.

Lofquist-Sprangel told investigators that even though the Nasseffs were paying him “an absurd amount of money,” he was “extremely stupid” with finances and so he stole things to supplement his income, the complaint said.

He told police he started by taking a couple of items but soon escalated, according to court documents.

He sold at least two pieces of jewelry valued at more than $1,000 each to local pawn shops last winter, the complaint said.

The family was able to recover about $1.37 million worth of their stolen belongings. They no longer keep valuable items in their home.

Despite catching Lofquist-Sprangel and obtaining a guilty plea in the case, Steve Nasseff said he is still troubled by what happened.

“It’s a violation like you can’t believe,” Steve Nasseff said. “Now I would never, ever hire an outsider to take care of my uncle. … We were told he was the best we would find. … We felt fortunate we had a guy we could trust.”

Not only did Lofquist-Sprangel steal from his uncle, but he also failed to take care of him properly, Steve Nasseff said.

He explained that video footage showed Lofquist-Sprangel neglecting to accompany his uncle to the bathroom, which was a critical component of his job duties because John Nasseff’s stroke left him prone to falling.

Though he tried to avoid troubling his uncle about what happened, he eventually had to tell him, Steve Nasseff said.

“He was upset, but he has taken it in stride,” Steve Nasseff said. “I felt like we kind of let him down in a way, but I’m happy we were able to get a lot of the stuff. … He is doing OK.”

Steve Nasseff said he plans to make a statement at Lofquist-Sprangel’s sentencing hearing April 10.

The state will argue that his crime warrants a longer sentence than the 42 months agreed to under his plea deal, according to court records. Conversely, Lofquist-Sprangel’s attorney will argue that his client, who has no other criminal record, should receive a stayed sentence.

MORE ABOUT JOHN NASSEFF

As the son of illiterate Lebanese immigrants, Nasseff and his six siblings lived largely hand-to-mouth in their home in St. Paul’s West Side Flats neighborhood.

When his father died, Nasseff dropped out of school in the ninth grade and took a job unloading boxcars and sweeping floors for West Publishing as it was making its start in downtown St. Paul. He worked his way up in the company, becoming a vice president, board member and major stock holder.

The company was sold to the Thomson Corp. for $3.4 billion in 1996, and Nasseff found himself rich, a multimillionaire at age 72. An efficiency expert, he retired as the company’s vice president for engineering and facilities.

Nasseff has spent much of the past 20 years serving as St. Paul’s most visible donor. His name adorns the Nasseff Heart Center at United Hospital, and his contributions have helped buy firearms and dogs for St. Paul police and the bells at the Church of St. Louis, King of France in downtown St. Paul.

He has funded youth soccer teams in Haiti, orphanages in Mexico and a medical clinic in his mother’s village in Lebanon.

It was a partly sunny spring day, and Brea Amanda Miller and her fiance were on their way to pick up their 2-year-old daughter from the toddler’s grandmother’s house when they got caught in traffic.

Bridge work lay ahead on Interstate 35W and a long line of cars were backed up along the freeway in New Brighton.

The couple waited at the back of the line when Destiny Xiong, on her way to pick up her own three children in Brooklyn Center, smashed into the rear of their car.

The impact crushed the couple’s Honda Fit, forcing the vehicle into the car in front of it, which in turn hit another car. Miller died three days later from her injuries. Her fiance, Michael Bain, survived but suffered a traumatic brain injury and broken ribs.

The defense and prosecuting attorneys now trying Xiong’s criminal vehicular homicide case don’t dispute that Xiong had just looked at a short text message — it said “Okay” — before the crash and was trying to place her phone on the dashboard when she accidentally dropped it.

It was just after she leaned over to retrieve it and looked up that the collision occurred, according to opening statements by defense attorney Earl Gray and Assistant Ramsey County attorney Margaret Gustafson Samec.

But they differ on how fast Xiong, 36, a human resources generalist for the Minneapolis police department, was driving at the time and whether her actions were merely careless, as her defense team suggests, or grossly negligent, as the state asserts.

The state needs to prove to the jury that Xiong was grossly negligent to win its case.

“This isn’t a speeding case; it’s a case about gross negligence … She chose to look down and dig around for that phone,” Samec said during her opening statement Wednesday, adding that Xiong drove past five signs related to the bridge work before the crash. “(Xiong) didn’t care about her own safety or the safety of the other drivers that day.”

Gray told the jurors that such a contention is off the mark.

He said the state’s crash reconstructionist made critical errors in estimating how fast Xiong was going that day, and said none of the signs Xiong drove past urged drivers to slow down. Most were detour signs, Gray said.

He added that the defense will show that Xiong was driving about 55 mph at the time, slightly less than the posted 60-mph speed limit.

Samec said the state trooper who reconstructed the crash scene estimates her speed was between 62 and 72 mph. That was revised down from initial estimates, which put her speed anywhere from 68 to 80 mph.

“We contend that Mrs. Xiong was negligent. … She (made) a mistake. She looked down to get (her phone) and when she looked up, there was a line of cars stopped in front of her. It was dead stopped,” Gray said Thursday. “She was careless, but she wasn’t grossly negligent.”

Testimony in Xiong’s case resumed Friday and likely will continue into next week.

The victim’s family and friends filled three rows in the Ramsey County District courtroom for the trial’s start. Xiong’s family also attended, including her husband, who sat in the front row.

Miller, of St. Paul, was remembered in her obituary as a “loving and devoted mother” who was quick to help anyone who needed it. She was 31 when she died. Her fiance, Bain, was 37 at the time.

In addition to criminal vehicular homicide, Xiong faces one count of criminal vehicular operation resulting in great bodily harm for Bain’s injuries.

The crash took place in the late afternoon of May 1, 2016, on 35W just north of County Road D.

An off-duty Minneapolis firefighter witnessed the collision and rushed to help. He was able to extricate Miller from the Honda Fit by cutting off her seat belt. A nurse also stopped and performed CPR on Miller while the firefighter tended to Bain, court records say.

Both were taken by ambulance to Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis.

Distracted driving was deemed a factor in more than 86,000 crashes across Minnesota between 2011 and 2015, contributing to more than one in four crashes in that time, according to the State Patrol.

In 2015, distracted driving contributed to 7,666 injuries and 74 deaths.

A Canadian man had his name cleared Monday when a jury found him not guilty of sexually assaulting a woman who had accused him of raping her after the two left an Uptown Minneapolis bar together last year.

Sam Prpich leaned his head down in relief as his attorney placed his hands on his shoulders to congratulate him when the verdicts were read in a Ramsey County District courtroom.

The jury found the 26-year-old not guilty of both the first and third-degree criminal sexual conduct counts filed against him a few months after the alleged incident occurred on Nov. 13, 2016.

Prpich was accused of raping a woman whom friends introduced him to at an Uptown Minneapolis bar that day.

The two left in a cab together to go back to his St. Paul apartment, where they engaged in consensual sex.

At some point during their encounter, the woman said Prpich pinned her down and forced her to briefly engage in a sexual act that was not consensual.

Prpich testified that his actions were accidental, caused by a dark room and alcohol.

His defense attorney, Brian Karalus, told the jury that the woman’s version of the events was dubious because she admitted to drinking about 10 alcoholic beverages before she and Prpich went back to his apartment.

He said there were several other holes in her narrative that didn’t make sense, reminding the jury that as the defendant, it was not Prpich’s job to prove why the woman might have lied about what happened.

The verdicts came as a “huge relief,” for his client, Karalus said, adding that both he and his family had spent the past year under great distress about the case.

Prpich moved back to Canada, where he is originally from, after the charges. Several of his family members flew in to attend his trial.

“He knew he was innocent and he wanted to clear his name,” Karalus said of Prpich.

“It’s absurd that someone, a stranger, can drink that much alcohol and make an allegation like that,” Karalus continued. “I think this trial … is a warning to parents that even if you have a son you need to worry about sending (them) to college… They need to be just as concerned as the women do when it comes to alcohol and sex because there are a lot of false allegations.”

His accuser, who was 22 at the time, was among those who testified at trial.

State prosecutors told the jury how difficult that is for victims to do and urged them to consider her sincerity and credibility.

The prosecution also pointed to statements Prpich made shortly after the incident, such as “I ruined your life and I ruined my life,” as indications of his guilt.

He added that his client passed a polygraph about what happened but said such findings are not admissible at trial.

The Ramsey County attorney’s office declined to comment about the verdict.

A Hudson, Wis., woman was careless when she fumbled for her cellphone and wound up crashing into a line of cars on Interstate 35W in New Brighton — resulting in a fatality and a serious injury. But she was not grossly negligent, according to a Ramsey County District Court jury.

Prosecutors had to prove gross negligence in their case against Destiny Xiong, who hit Brea Miller and Michael Bain’s Honda Fit as it sat stopped in traffic on the afternoon of May 1, 2016. Miller died and Bain, her fiance, was seriously injured.

After less than an hour of deliberations Tuesday morning, the jury found Xiong not guilty of the most serious counts: criminal vehicular homicide and criminal vehicular operation resulting in great bodily harm.

She was found guilty of careless driving, a misdemeanor.

Xiong, 36, wiped away tears and hugged her defense attorneys after the verdicts were read.

Her relief stood in contrast to the reaction from the victims’ families, some of whom sobbed and refused to stand for jury members as they exited the courtroom until a legal advocate urged them to do so.

“It was a just verdict,” Xiong’s defense attorney, Earl Gray, said following the trial. “This wasn’t a criminal homicide case. (Xiong) wasn’t grossly negligent.”

Bain disagreed, calling the jury’s findings “shameful” and referring to what he sees as grossly inadequate consequences for distracted driving in Minnesota as an “epidemic.”

“My daughter will go through her entire life without a mother. This is not justice,” Bain said. “This will continue to happen.”

In a statement, the Ramsey County attorney’s office said: “Despite a finding of guilt on the added count of careless driving, we are obviously disappointed with the not guilty verdicts for the felony counts but we respect the jury’s decision.”

Bain, then 37, and Miller, 31, were on their way to pick up their then-2-year-old daughter from her grandmother’s house when they got caught in traffic caused by bridge work on I-35W just north of County Road D.

The St. Paul couple were waiting at the back of the line of cars when Xiong, on her way to pick up her own three children in Brooklyn Center, smashed into the rear of their car.

The impact crushed the couple’s Honda Fit, forcing the vehicle into the car in front of it, which in turn hit another car.

Miller died three days later. Bain suffered a traumatic brain injury and broken ribs.

The prosecution and defense both agreed that Xiong’s distracted driving caused the crash.

She admitted to authorities that she just looked at a short text message from one of her children on her phone — the message read “Okay” — when she accidentally dropped it.

She had just retrieved it and was attempting to place it on her dash when she looked up and found herself crashing into the vehicle in front of her, according to legal documents.

Where the prosecution and defense differed was on whether Xiong’s actions amounted to gross negligence.

Assistant Ramsey County Attorney Margaret Samec argued that they did. Samec told the jury during her opening statement that Xiong was driving between 62 and 72 mph when she smashed into the line of cars and had traveled past five signs warning her of the upcoming bridge work.

But the defense argued that the state’s crash reconstruction expert made critical errors in estimating how fast Xiong was going that day.

None of the signs Xiong drove past urged drivers to slow down, the defense maintained. Most were detour signs, Gray said during his opening statement.

An expert hired by the defense testified that he estimated Xiong’s speed at the time to be between 51 and 64 mph. The speed limit was 60 mph.

Speaking after the trial, sometimes through tears, Bain said he has spent the past months trying to adjust to life as a single father to his and Miller’s now-4-year-old daughter, Isabel.

“She was the best mother I have ever seen,” he said of Miller. “That’s all she wanted was to be a mother, and that bond was broken when Isabel was 2 years old.”

Xiong works in human resources for the Minneapolis Police Department. She has no other criminal convictions on her record.

She had tears in her eyes as she left the courthouse holding hands with her husband Tuesday afternoon, her other family members following close behind.

She declined to comment on the verdict.

Xiong is expected to be sentenced on her misdemeanor conviction in April.

The St. Paul attorney who struck and killed a jogger in St. Paul last winter will not face felony charges.

The decision comes after the Hennepin County attorney’s office reviewed evidence in the case against Peter Berge and determined the 61-year-old was not under the influence of drugs or alcohol at the time of the collision, nor was he on his cellphone, the office reported Wednesday morning.

As such, Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman found Berge’s conduct not to be grossly negligent and declined to file felony charges.

Prosecutors relied on witness statements and accident reconstruction to make their decision, the office reported.

Their analysis estimated that Berge was driving just over 30 mph at the time of the collision and that he drifted into oncoming traffic several times before shifting back into the correct lane, authorities say.

The speed limit on the roadway is 25 mph.

A massive tumor was discovered on Berge’s brain two days after he fatally struck Scott Spoo at Mississippi River Boulevard and Dayton Avenue about 4:40 p.m. Feb. 22, 2017, authorities say.

Spoo, 35, of St. Paul, died about an hour after the crash at Hennepin County Medical Center. He was a 3M senior product development engineer in the stationery and office supplies division, and an avid runner and bicyclist.

Police arrested Berge on suspicion of criminal vehicle operation shortly after his sport-utility vehicle collided with Spoo in the crosswalk.

Police said Spoo was not wearing headphones or earbuds when he was struck, and officers suspected Berge of being under the influence because he failed balance tests. They also said at the time that there was reason to believe he might have been on his cellphone.

A search of Berge’s cellphone records has subsequently revealed that he had not been on his phone since 4:26 p.m. that day, according to the Hennepin County attorney’s office.

“This is a tragic and sad case,” Freeman said in a written statement. “We extend our deepest sympathies to Mr. Spoo’s family. Had Mr. Berge been drinking or if he had fled the scene we could have charged him with criminal vehicular homicide. That was not the case. There was no evidence of gross negligence, either.”

Berge has been a lawyer in Minnesota for more than 30 years, and was among the financial contributors to Ramsey County attorney John Choi’s past campaigns.

As such, the case was referred to Hennepin County to review for possible charges to avoid any potential conflict of interest.

Reached at his home, Berge deferred any comments on the charging decision to his attorney, Charles Hawkins.

Speaking on his behalf, Hawkins said he and Berge were “very appreciative” of Freeman’s decision.

“We are just appreciative for the time and the effort that the Hennepin County attorney’s office gave in reviewing the case and their willingness to hear our side of things before they made their decision,” Hawkins said.

He added that he provided medical records about Berge’s cancer diagnosis to the authorities.

Berge’s brain tumor affects his vision, Hawkins said, and therefore prevented Berge from seeing Spoo in the crosswalk that day.

He declined to get into the specifics of Berge’s prognosis but said the combination of the diagnosis and his involvement in the fatal collision have been “extremely traumatic” for the longtime attorney.

The Spoo family’s civil attorney, Jay Urban, said that while he understands the high burden of proof needed to pursue felony charges, he and the Spoo family still believe Berge’s conduct was grossly negligent.

“While I can tell you as a lawyer I understand the (charging) decision, on a personal level the family is disappointed that you can kill somebody with your automobile and at least for now escape consequences,” Urban said.

He added that he and his team have pursued their own investigation into the accident as they prepare to file a civil lawsuit in the case.

That should be filed after the St. Paul city attorney’s office reviews the case for any possible misdemeanor-level charges, Urban said.

This last year has been exceptionally hard for the Spoo family as they endured a year of many firsts without Scott Spoo present, according to Holly Spoo, his sister.

The outpouring of support she and her family have received from loved ones has helped, she added.

Bike rides in his honor have taken place, for example, and trail fix-it stations and benches installed to help remember him, she said.

“So just those different things, and people reaching out and keeping in touch, has been helpful,” she said.

She declined to comment about Wednesday’s charging decision.

Erin and Darrell Crider stood with their 8-year-old son and released purple balloons into the sky to mark their daughter’s birthday this year.

They wished they were cutting cake and watching their would-be 2-year-old tear open birthday presents with family and friends. Instead, they spent Jan. 30 huddled outside at the spot they buried Susannah after the 6-month-old died in the care of her in-home North St. Paul day care provider, Amy Jo Englebretson.

Englebretson placed the child in a car seat on her bed for the girl’s nap the morning of Aug. 8, 2016. Susannah slipped down while she slept, her neck got caught in the seat’s straps, and she suffocated.

Erin Crider described what it was like to get a call at work from police that day, when she spoke at Englebretson’s sentencing hearing for second-degree manslaughter Wednesday afternoon.

She also told the court what it was like to hold her daughter’s dead body for hours at the hospital, to have to leave her there alone, to tell her son that his baby sister was gone, to get up every morning without her, and to try not to blame herself.

“I ask for a prison sentence not out of anger … I have forgiven Amy … but I ask that the court recognize that my daughter was not just a name on a birth certificate … she was my baby girl,” Erin Crider told Ramsey County District Judge Judith Tilsen.

Her husband, Darrell Crider, told Tilsen that Englebretson lied to him and his wife about the status of her license, how many kids she was caring for, and what kind of sleeping arrangements would be made for their daughter.

“I have spent countless hours (asking myself) … did we miss a sign that should have told us something wasn’t right here?  … How did we not see this? … Why did we trust her?” he said. “These thoughts will haunt me for the rest of my life.”

Englebretson leaned against a wall in the courtroom next to her defense attorney, Earl Gray, and cried as the parents spoke.

When it was her turn to speak, she sobbed.

“I am so sorry and I think about her every day, all day, and I plan on living my life devoted to her,” Englebretson said through her tears.

The 45-year-old pleaded guilty to the charge filed against her this past August, about a year after she called police to say that a baby girl was unresponsive in her home on the 2300 block of South Avenue in North St. Paul.

By the time authorities arrived, the child was lying lifeless on a rug in the living room, despite Englebretson’s attempts to resuscitate her.

She told officers that she strapped the girl into a car seat on her bed for her nap that morning. When she returned to check on her a short time later, the baby wasn’t breathing.

Englebretson, who did not have a day care license, had 10 children in her home at the time, five of whom were toddlers or younger.

State law mandates that day care providers be licensed and limits the number of children in a home to eight if more than two of the children are toddlers or younger, according to the Minnesota Department of Human Services.

Englebretson had twice been cited for caring for too many children at once while operating as a day care provider in Wisconsin.

Tilsen pointed to that past when she opted to sentence Englebretson to about three and a half years in prison Wednesday. Her attorney tried to convince the judge his client deserved probation due to her clean criminal history, her remorse and her support in the community.

Englebretson’s five children and several of her other family and friends attended the sentencing hearing.

A few started wailing when Tilsen handed down the prison sentence and guards took Englebretson — who had previously been out on bail — into custody.

A St. Paul man confessed to using a steel pipe to repeatedly strike an intruder he discovered in his garage last summer until the man stopped moving.

Then he covered up his dead body and let it decompose on his property for weeks.

John Michael Erickson made the admission during a plea hearing in Ramsey County District Court on Tuesday morning. The 50-year-old pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree manslaughter in the death of Allan “Buddy” Bishara Aguilar, 47. Erickson also pleaded guilty to interference with a dead body.

The plea deal was reached after the state agreed to dismiss the second-degree murder charge previously facing Erickson in exchange for his admission.

Erickson’s defense attorney John Riemer asked him to describe his actions leading up to Aguilar’s death to Ramsey County District Judge Nicole Starr.

Erickson said he was downstairs in his home in St. Paul’s Payne-Phalen neighborhood sometime between June 13 and July 14, 2017, when he heard something fall in his garage.

Suspicious, he went upstairs to put on some shorts and then proceeded into his dark garage.

“Once you were in the garage, you were confronted by someone, correct?” Riemer asked his client.

“Yes … I was going through my woodshop … and that’s when I got hit … and we started fighting,” Erickson said.

Describing himself as fearful and angry, Erickson said he fumbled for a weapon and found a steel pipe, which he used to repeatedly hit the intruder — including at least one blow to the head — until the man stopped moving.

Then he said he moved the dead body to the side of his garage and covered him up with layers of bedding.

It wasn’t until later that he discovered that the person he killed was Aguilar, a man he’d been angry with for stealing his tools, Erickson said in court.

Though Erickson said his actions were fueled by fear, Riemer was careful to clarify that his client was not claiming self-defense, which Erickson could assert if he decided to take his case to trial but not in an admission of guilt to first-degree manslaughter.

“You admit … that you lost control and acted in a heat of passion?” Riemer asked him.

“Yes,” Erickson said.

Authorities discovered Aguilar’s body after friends of Aguilar’s broke into Erickson’s garage to look for the missing man last July.

A medical examiner determined that the body had been decomposing for about four weeks, which puts Aguilar’s time of death sometime between when he was last seen June 13 and when his remains were found July 14, according to court records.

His skull was crushed by Erickson’s blows.

Erickson told police after his arrest that he concealed the body because he hadn’t known what to do with it and hoped maggots would take care of it.

Erickson will be sentenced April 9.

Joy Hundley couldn’t be at the sentencing for the man who, while driving drunk, struck her in a St. Paul intersection as he was on her way home from work last September.

Instead, the 51-year-old was at a nursing home, where she’s expected to spend her foreseeable future after sustaining a traumatic brain injury in the accident.

The mother of four daughters — her youngest is 13 — slid under Gary Thomas Schmalz’ vehicle when he struck her at the corner of Fillmore and Robert streets about 9:20 p.m. Sept. 27, 2017.

The night shift employee at Comcast was about a block from work.

She was rushed to Regions Hospital, where she subsequently had to undergo seven surgeries to keep her alive. A portion of her skull was removed during one of the operations due to the magnitude of swelling in her brain.

These days, she needs help eating, changing her clothes and getting in and out of bed, according to court testimony provided by Hundley’s family during Schmalz’s sentencing hearing Thursday.

She struggles to string the right words together to form coherent sentences and fidgets with a quilt to keep her focus while family members try to engage with her.

“He has taken the life of a beautiful woman,” Hundley’s brother, Richard Gullickson, wrote in a statement read aloud in Ramsey County Court at the sentencing. “She may be breathing but she does not live as she lived before.”

“This incident has taken our mother away from us,” added Hundley’s daughter, Jennifer Hamborg, in her statement. “I can’t explain the pain I have seen in my sisters’ faces … How bad my heart hurts.”

Schmalz, who posted bail in the case, stood quietly in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt while Ramsey County District Judge Richard Kyle listened to the ways Hundley’s life had been altered.

The 64-year-old South Carolina man consumed about four beers and several shots of whiskey while fishing at Raspberry Island before hopping in his car the night of the accident.

He struck Hundley blocks later. He also admitted to having smoked marijuana that day when he pleaded guilty in December to one count of criminal vehicular operation causing great bodily harm while under the influence of alcohol.

He expressed regret when it was his turn to address the court Thursday.

“The vocabulary doesn’t contain the words to express my feelings,” he said. “I want to say I’m sorry. Words fail me.”

Due to Schmalz’s scant criminal history, Minnesota’s sentencing guidelines, and the fact that there were not aggravating factors in the case, he wasn’t eligible to receive a prison sentence for the offense, according to the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office.

The presumptive sentence under such circumstances is a stayed sentence, which is what Schmalz ended up receiving at his hearing.

In addition to a five-year-stayed sentence, the judge did end up mandating that Schmalz serve another 31 days in jail in addition to the 79 days he already served in the case.

He also needs to stay sober, undergo mental health programming and abide by the other terms of his probation.

Kyle told Schmalz he hoped the extra jail time would persuade him to never make the same mistake. Schmalz was also convicted of a DWI about 15 years ago.

“This is a tragedy on many levels,” Kyle told him. “You will have to live with this for the rest of your life.”

When it was her turn to speak, Schmalz’s attorney, Katie Allen, told the court she wanted to clear up what she described as inaccuracies that were included in the criminal complaint about her client’s actions the day of the collision.

Schmalz did exactly as he should have after the accident, Allen said. He got out of his car, went to the victim to check on her condition, and then waited nearby for the authorities to arrive.

While some witnesses at the scene suggested he should have moved his car, Allen argued that he kept it in place to aid the authorities’ investigation.

She added that the former member of the United States Navy also admitted what he did immediately, cooperated with police, and has consistently shown remorse.

A 20-year-old St. Paul man was sentenced to seven years in prison for his role in a shooting that left a young woman in a wheelchair.

Latre Lamont Anderson apologized for his actions before Ramsey County District Judge Richard Kyle handed down his sentence Thursday morning.

“I was going to apologize to the victim, but she ain’t here,” Anderson said.

She wanted to be present, the state prosecutor handling the case told the court, but Diamante Marie Jorge-Salgado couldn’t make it because the taxi she intended to take couldn’t accommodate noncollapsible wheelchairs.

“Mr. Anderson will get out of prison. This victim will not get out of her wheelchair,” the prosecutor told the judge while asking that he abide by the terms of the plea agreement reached in the case.

In exchange for Anderson’s agreement to plead guilty to one count of first-degree assault resulting in great bodily harm, the state dismissed the other charges previously facing him, which included two counts of committing a crime to benefit a gang.

“I’m hit. I’m hit. I’m hit. I can’t move my legs. I can’t move them at all,” Jorge-Salgado cried as a bullet ripped through her back last October, according to statements her boyfriend and other passengers in the vehicle she was riding in that day later gave to police.

The young woman was sitting in the passenger seat of her boyfriend’s car when a car pulled up beside them at the intersection of Western Avenue and Minnehaha Avenue Oct. 22, 2017, according to the criminal complaint in the case.

When she turned her head, she told police, she saw Anderson — a man she recognized as the brother of one of her acquaintances — driving the vehicle. When she realized he was holding a handgun, she said she told her boyfriend to drive away.

That’s when she says she heard a “loud boom” and immediately felt intense pressure in her back as she realized she was bleeding, court documents say.

Her boyfriend drove her to the hospital and later told officers he recently “had beef” with three of Anderson’s friends during the Rondo Days Parade, the complaint said.

Anderson was a member of the Everybody Killer gang, authorities say. Jorge-Salgado’s boyfriend is affiliated with the Time for Money gang, the complaint said.

Despite Anderson’s past gang affiliations, his attorney Connie Iverson told the court Thursday that he had been making strides to get his life on track.

He was working, going to school and being a “good father,” Iverson said.

After handing down his sentence, Kyle wished Anderson luck.

“You’re a smart guy … and you can certainly be a productive member of society (when you get out of prison),” he told him.

Neither Jorge-Salgado nor her relatives could be immediately reached for comment.

A Minneapolis man and a 17-year-old were charged Tuesday in connection with the kidnapping and rape of a woman who was abducted at gunpoint outside her Uptown apartment this past October.

Deonte Lawson, 23, and Darrius Freeman, 17, both face charges of first-, second- and third-degree criminal sexual conduct as well as counts of kidnapping and auto theft, according to criminal complaints filed against them in Hennepin County District Court. Lawson has yet to be arrested.

A woman was getting something out of the trunk of her car parked outside her Uptown apartment late Oct. 15 or early Oct. 16 when Lawson, Freeman and another male juvenile forced her into the back seat of her car at gunpoint, the Hennepin County attorney’s office reported.

They used her credit cards to pay for food at White Castle and then took her to a secluded wooded area, where they took turns sexually assaulting her, legal documents say.

Afterward, as they made their way toward Washington County, the woman feared for her life and convinced the driver that they needed to stop for gas, the complaint said.

When they stopped to refuel at a gas station on Manning Trail in Scandia, she ran barefoot from the vehicle into nearby woods.

Though one of her attackers followed, he eventually gave up and the three drove away, the complaint said.

Tenants who lived above the gas station let the woman use their cellphone to call for help.

Based on her description of her assailants and surveillance video captured at locations where her stolen credit cards were used, police were able to produce photos of the men involved, the county attorney’s office reported.

They located Freeman during the afternoon of Oct. 16 after Minneapolis police responded to a report of reckless driving and encountered Freeman in the driver’s seat of the woman’s stolen vehicle, according to the juvenile petition filed against him.

While not yet filed, charges against the third unnamed juvenile “are likely,” according to the Hennepin County attorney’s office.

Freeman is being held in juvenile detention while police look for Lawson.

Staff and students were evacuated from a Minneapolis high school Tuesday afternoon when an apparent gunman ran into the building, according to the school district and police.

According to police, officers were summoned around 3:30 p.m. when a male, possibly armed, was seen trying to board a Metro Transit bus. The individual fled and was seen by witnesses entering a side door of Patrick Henry High School.

The school went into lockdown and police conducted a search of the building in North Minneapolis.

As of 5:30 p.m., the district reported that all students and staff were safe and that police were continuing to search the building for the suspect, even though a surveillance camera showed the male leaving the building within minutes of entering, according to police and the school district.

The incident took place after classes had ended for the day, so few students were in the school. Police later said that some 200 students and staff were evacuated and placed on waiting Metro Transit buses.

Police said late Tuesday night that the suspect had not been located. The individual was described as a black male, 5 feet 6 inches tall with a slender build. He was wearing a puffy gray jacket and brown beanie cap.

No weapons were found in the school.

Classes at Patrick Henry will resume Wednesday, the district reported.

Police on Tuesday night were investigating what appears to be a fatal shooting in South Minneapolis, authorities said.

Officers responding to a report of shots fired on the 700 block of East 18th Street at 6:10 p.m. Tuesday discovered a man injured from a suspected gunshot wound, according to Minneapolis police spokesman John Elder.

The man was taken by ambulance to Hennepin County Medical Center, where he later died.

His name was not immediately released.

Preliminary investigation indicated the man was involved in an exchange of words with another individual before shots were fired, Elder said.

The suspected shooter fled on foot.

Anyone with information about the incident is asked to contact Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS.

With a long scar visible atop his head from where part of his skull was removed to alleviate his brain swelling, Markus Jackson stood in a Ramsey County courtroom Wednesday and told the man responsible for it that he forgave him.

The 20-year-old spoke quietly with his hands behind his back as he described how his life has changed since Tyler Bjelland drove drunk at speeds nearing 100 mph in a residential area of St. Paul and crashed into the city bus Jackson and several others rode last July 21.

Jackson was gravely injured in the crash. Kenneth Foster, 48 — a father of six and grandfather of seven — was killed. Several others, including children, suffered minor injuries.

“In all honesty, I just want to let him know that I forgive him. … I hope he gets the help that he needs,” Jackson said, nodding toward Bjelland, 27, who sat in an orange jumpsuit next to his attorney.

Forgiveness quickly became the theme of the hearing. It was a rare tone at sentencings, where victims’ families often express anger toward defendants.

“I want you to save as many people out there (as you can) … to be able to tell people don’t drink and drive,” Yolanda Sims, Foster’s best friend, told Bjelland of how she hopes he’ll spend his time.

“We are hurt, but we forgive you,” Sims continued. “Everybody is not perfect. … We just have to learn from our mistakes.”

Her comments echoed those of Foster’s children.

Demarus Brown, his son, told Bjelland he loved him before letting him know that he also forgave him. Foster’s daughter, Lawanda Foster Larson, said she prayed for him.

“You took a big ol’ piece of my heart, but I forgive you,” said another of Foster’s daughters, Kenyatta Foster.

BJELLAND: ‘I TAKE RESPONSIBILITY’

Bjelland nodded his head through their remarks. He kept his comments short when it was his turn to speak.

“I just appreciate the family forgiving me. … I appreciate that a lot,” Bjelland said. “And I take responsibility.”

Assistant Ramsey County Attorney Margaret Samec thanked Bjelland for sparing the victims and their families a trial in the case. He agreed to plead guilty to the two criminal counts filed against him following what she described as a “horrific” crash: criminal vehicular homicide for Foster’s death and criminal vehicular operation for Jackson’s injuries.

Bjelland also agreed not to contest that aggravating factors were present in the case that warranted a longer sentence than state guidelines call for.

Ramsey County District Judge Sara Grewing pointed out those factors before sentencing him to 10 years in prison on count one and five years on count two. The terms will be served concurrently.

Bjelland’s blood-alcohol level was two and a half times the legal limit for driving at the time of the crash, which took place during rush hour near the intersection of Dale Street and Charles Avenue in St. Paul.

The impact ejected Foster from the bus and left a gaping hole in the side of the vehicle.

Bjelland had to be extricated from his Impala and couldn’t walk for months.

The crash came just over a year after Bjelland was convicted of third-degree drinking and driving.

“Words fail me a little bit,” the judge said to Foster’s family. “I cannot imagine what you have been through … and the fact that you came into this courtroom and every one of you forgave him … tells me that you were led by a great man.”

VICTIM’S FRIEND, DEFENDANT’S PARENTS HUG

Bjelland’s defense attorney, public defender Kelley Malone O’Neill, also commented on the victims’ willingness to forgive her client.

“What was done in this courtroom this morning … has struck me as the most compelling statements that a family could make in my 30 years of practice.”

She went on to say that Bjelland has thought about his actions every day since the accident and that he had tried and failed for months to come up with the words to sum up his remorse.

“There are no words,” Malone O’Neill said. “So he agreed to the maximum sentence allowed by the law.”

Yolanda Sims exchanged prolonged, tearful hugs with Bjelland’s father and stepmother after the sentencing.

“I know he is going to get out and do right and everything you taught him is going to make sense,” she said to Bruce Bjelland.

Bruce Bjelland characterized the hearing as “touching.” He had only one message to share with the public about his son’s case: “Alcohol destroys human lives,” he said.

SURVIVOR ‘JUST HAPPY TO BE ALIVE’

Jackson was hospitalized for more than two weeks after the crash.

In addition to the scar on his head, the Central High School graduate has rods in his ankles and medical bills nearing $500,000, he said.

Though his doctor has advised him not to work, he was allowed to resume school and was expected in class at St. Paul College just hours after Bjelland’s sentencing Wednesday.

The psychology major said he wants to open a nonprofit practice in the future that will make counseling more affordable for trauma victims.

Finding forgiveness for Bjelland wasn’t hard, Jackson said.

“As soon as I was out of the hospital, it just came to me. … This was an accident. He wasn’t targeting me.

“It takes a stronger person to forgive someone than to hold onto anger,” he continued. “I am just happy to be alive.”

A GoFundMe account has been set up for anyone wishing to help Jackson cover his medical expenses.

A day or two after a bicyclist was fatally struck in a hit-and-run accident in St. Paul in November, authorities say Dustin Hegner Royce showed up to his landscaping job with damage to the front end of his mom’s Hyundai Santa Fe.

His boss told police that Hegner Royce had the midsized SUV parked on the side of the property so the damage couldn’t be easily seen. The 28-year-old said he struck a deer, according to authorities.

Shortly thereafter, the vehicle was gone, Hegner Royce’s boss told police.

While investigators continue to search for the vehicle, they are no longer looking for the people they believe are to blame for a fatal hit-and-run that left Jose Hernandez Solano lying motionless on the street at the intersection of Grand Avenue and West Seventh in St. Paul.

Authorities on Friday charged both Hegner Royce and his mother, Abbey Hegner, for their respective roles in the deadly collision, according to criminal complaints filed against them in Ramsey County District Court.

Hegner Royce faces two counts of criminal vehicular homicide for allegedly driving the car that struck 52-year-old Hernandez Solano as he biked home from his job at Brasa Rotisserie on Nov. 26.

Hegner, 47, faces two counts of aiding an offender for allegedly helping her son cover up the crime, authorities say.

The two were arrested and questioned in connection with the case in December but were released without being charged. They were arrested again Friday morning.

“It’s very somber for the fact that this doesn’t bring him back by any means, but at least there seems to be some accountability coming out of it,” said Megan Gall, the general manager of St. Paul’s Brasa location. “They are finally suffering the consequences of their poor actions.”

SUV RAN RED LIGHT, STRUCK BICYCLIST

Hernandez Solano was biking home from his job as a dishwasher at Brasa on Grand Avenue  — he was wearing a helmet and had front and rear bicycle lights — when he entered the intersection of Grand and West Seventh. That’s when an SUV ran a red light and struck him at 12:10 a.m.

Hernandez Solano suffered head and spinal injuries and was taken by ambulance to a hospital. The driver of the SUV fled.

Hernandez Solano died Dec. 7 after being taken off life support.

ANONYMOUS TIP LED POLICE TO MOTHER AND SON

Evidence collected at the crash scene pointed to a “platinum sage” metallic Hyundai Santa Fe from 2008 through 2010. Police subsequently filed several search warrants as they tried to identify the driver.

They began to circle in on Abbey Hegner and Dustin Hegner Royce after a tip that a vehicle matching the description was often seen at Keenan’s Bar.

The tipster provided a license plate, which police traced to Hegner, legal documents say.

Keenan’s, at West Seventh Street and Western Avenue, is about a half-mile west of the crash site. The hit-and-run vehicle was westbound on Seventh Street, police have said.

Hegner was working as a bartender at Keenan’s at the time.

A patron at the bar that night told the bar manager that he witnessed Hegner Royce drive up to the establishment minutes after the crash, according to details in a search warrant.

His mother was outside smoking a cigarette, the patron said. The two talked briefly before Hegner went inside and told her boss she needed to leave, court documents say.

Another patron who was outside with Hegner told officers that Hegner Royce ran up and said, “Mom, I need your help,” before the two left, according to legal documents.

Hegner reportedly told her boss she had needed to leave because her son’s girlfriend was suicidal. She would later give police a different reason she left when she was arrested Dec. 15.

Her boss told police she seemed “upset like he has never seen before” at the time, the search warrant application said.

PHONE CALLS, VIDEO EVIDENCE

Searches of Hegner’s phone showed multiple outgoing and incoming calls starting at 12:23 a.m. on Nov. 26. The phone traveled through Mendota Heights, St. Paul and South St. Paul during that period, legal documents say.

One of the phone numbers that repeatedly contacted her is registered as one of her old numbers, which was being used at the time by her son, the search warrant application said.

Another was registered to the mother of Hegner Royce’s girlfriend.

Video captured around the time of the crash at a nearby Holiday gas station reportedly shows the suspect vehicle as well as someone matching Hegner Royce’s description.

Other surveillance footage reportedly traced the SUV’s path from the crash site back to Kellogg Boulevard and over the Wabasha Bridge, the criminal complaint said.

The footage shows the vehicle speeding, illegally passing other vehicles and ignoring traffic signs as it makes its way toward the intersection of West Seventh and Grand Avenue, authorities say.

Afterward, footage shows the vehicle with what appeared to be front-end damage near Mancini’s Char House, a restaurant a short distance from Keenan’s, the complaint said.

In a recorded jailhouse phone conversation made after her December arrest in the case, Hegner reportedly told someone the police didn’t have any evidence, legal documents say.

Hegner Royce told officers he had no memory of being at a Holiday gas station the night of the collision or picking up his mother, according to the criminal complaint.

When police showed up at his home on Dec. 18, his girlfriend said “she knew why they were there,” but that she hadn’t seen the vehicle in question for months, legal documents say.

She also allegedly told police that she was not suicidal on Nov. 26, as Hegner had told her boss.

SUSPECT VEHICLE STILL MISSING

Many of the search warrants filed in the case appeared aimed at trying to determine whether Hegner was lying about the whereabouts of her Hyundai Santa Fe, which police have been unable to locate.

After her earlier arrest, Hegner told police she sold the vehicle to an “unknown Mexican or Somali male” whom she had been unable to understand for $3,000 four days before the deadly crash, court documents say.

But a search warrant conducted at Hegner’s home found a bag containing the vehicle’s owner’s manual, and other paperwork also had receipts for Burger King and McDonald’s dated two days before the collision, the complaint said.

Video footage from Burger King showed a vehicle matching the description of the suspect vehicle at the drive-thru window with a driver matching Hegner Royce’s description, authorities say.

Hegner also reportedly admitted to officers that she still had a $5,000 lien on the SUV at the time of the sale that she’s continuing to make payments on.

Hegner Royce’s criminal history includes convictions for driving after his license was suspended, petty-misdemeanor-level drug possession, possession of a pistol without a permit and possession of a dangerous weapon.

Hegner’s criminal history includes three alcohol-related driving offenses.

Neither has a felony on their record.

The mother and son were in custody Friday afternoon and could not be reached for comment.

VICTIM WAS FATHER, AVID CYCLIST 

Hernandez Solano was a father of three and one of 13 children.His three children all reside in Mexico near the city of Leon.

Gall said she was in touch with his family Friday morning.

“I think it just brings up some hard feelings but it’s good that it will hopefully start the process of getting some closure,” she said.

The Vadnais Heights father of a 13-year-old boy who reportedly threatened a classmate had a machine gun and a short-barreled shotgun — both illegal — among several other firearms discovered at his home last week, authorities say.

Christopher Lloyd Stowe; his wife, Lisa Stowe; and their son all face criminal charges after police responded to a reported threat at a Maplewood school last week.

The 41-year-old father faces two felony-level counts of prohibited possession of a machine gun and short-barreled shotgun and a third count of negligent storage of firearms, according to the criminal complaint filed against him Monday in Ramsey County District Court. The latter charge is a gross misdemeanor.

Christopher Stowe was released without bail Monday after a brief appearance in court on conditions he doesn’t possess firearms and remains law-abiding.

After the hearing, Christopher Stowe’s attorney Sam Surface told the media that the couple are “very good people.”

“They are hardworking people, they both have jobs. … They are normal, everyday Minnesotans,” Surface said.

Asked about the impact of last month’s school shooting in Florida on the case, Surface said he thought the matter would hinge more on search and seizure issues than gun rights.

“I don’t think this is a litmus test case for (gun rights) even though guns are involved,” Surface said.

Christopher Stowe’s next court appearance is scheduled for March 13.

Lisa Stowe also was charged Monday afternoon by the Vadnais Heights city attorney with one count of gross-misdemeanor-level negligent storage of a firearm. She was also released Monday without bail after a court appearance.

The couple’s son was charged with one felony count of threats of violence.

CASE BEGAN WITH ALLEGED SCHOOL THREAT

Ramsey County sheriff deputies went to the family’s home on the 4200 block of DeSoto Street on Thursday after receiving a report that a 13-year-old boy had told another student that he planned to kill him and that he had a list with names of other students he also intended to kill, the complaint said.

When deputies questioned the juvenile about his comments, the teen said he hadn’t meant them and that he would never do something like that again, authorities say.

Deputies also spoke to the child’s mother, who said at the time that the teen didn’t have access to firearms and that there were none inside their house, according to the complaint.

Investigators then got a search warrant.

NUMEROUS WEAPONS CONFISCATED

The boy was home alone when deputies arrived Friday to execute the warrant. They found numerous firearms at the residence, the complaint said.

Several of the firearms were loaded and left out in the open, authorities say.

Two of the weapons also met the definition for machine guns and a short-barreled shotgun — both illegal in Minnesota, the complaint said.

Investigators also found possible explosive devices in the house, as well as several trigger kits hidden in the home’s ceiling, legal documents say.

The kits “appeared to be conversion kits for converting weapons to automatic weapons,” the complaint said.

Before the search, Christopher Stowe told an investigator that he had guns in the house and that they belonged to him, the complaint said.

He reportedly requested an attorney after being pressed for more information.

PARENT: ‘IT COULD’VE BEEN A TRAGEDY’

A Ramsey County sheriff’s office spokeswoman, Becqi Sherman, said a parent of a student reported the threat to them.

Jessica Pigg, who said her son was threatened, told KSTP-TV she called the school and an administrator downplayed the issue. The school is on spring break and the executive director could not be reached for comment Monday.

“It could’ve been a tragedy,” Pigg told KSTP-TV. “… They’re in charge of our children’s safety and they neglected to keep children … out of danger.”

GRANDFATHER: IT WAS AN INAPPROPRIATE JOKE

Mark Stowe, the teen’s grandfather and Christopher Stowe’s father, said the incident began when his grandson, who he said has autism, and some other kids were watching an episode of the show “Family Guy” that dealt with violence.

After a friend asked him if he’d ever use a gun, Mark Stowe said his grandson made an inappropriate joke.

Mark Stowe said such conduct needs to be taken seriously, particularly in light of the recent school shooting in Florida. But he believes the school handled it appropriately by notifying parents and suspending his grandson for two days.

He also approved of the sheriff’s office’s decision to send a deputy to the home to talk to his grandson about what happened. But things took an unnecessary turn when the office decided to execute a search warrant, he said.

“This is a bad, over-the-top reaction to an incident,” Mark Stowe said. “This is all staging for (Sheriff Jack Serier) to get into national headlines.”

The guns found inside the house are part of a collection, Mark Stowe said.

While there may have been one or two firearms that were loaded and outside of a safe in the house, Mark Stowe said they were still hidden away and not easily accessible to children.

He added that his grandchildren have grown up around guns and understand gun safety. He said he had been using the equipment found to modify firearms to help him alter some of his firearms so he would have better control of them during target practice.

WILL CASE TURN POLITICAL?

Serier, who was appointed sheriff by the Ramsey County board of commissioners last year, is running for the job in November.

Martin said anyone who possesses guns without the proper licenses should be held accountable, but he wrote in an open letter Monday: “The interim sheriff exploited this situation for political reasons and to create ‘good press’ for himself. In the process, he stigmatized a family and special needs child, failed to provide the care an autistic child needed, and tainted any evidence needed for prosecution.”

Sherman of the sheriff’s office said Monday, “there’s nothing further to comment on” and referred additional questions to prosecutors.

CASE A TEACHING MOMENT SAYS NEIGHBOR

Dawn Metcalf, a neighbor who picked up Christopher Stowe from jail, said she hopes this incident can serve as a “teaching moment.”

“Rather than persecute a normal family,” Metcalf said she hopes what happened will serve as an important reminder that “if you have minor children in your house, you need to store (guns) safely.”

As far as the juvenile, Metcalf said his parents have been “worried sick” about him as all three spent the weekend separately in custody.

Mara H. Gottfried contributed to this report.

READ THE CHARGES

Upset that the woman had turned down his romantic advances, a Minneapolis man urinated in his co-worker’s water bottle, authorities say.

Conrrado Cruz Perez, 47, was charged with two counts of adulterating a substance with bodily fluids, according to the criminal complaint filed against him in Ramsey County District Court.

The first count is a gross-misdemeanor; the second is a misdemeanor.

Deputies responded to a Perkins restaurant in Vadnais Heights last October after a 42-year-old employee at the restaurant reported that she was being harassed by a baker.

She told investigators that she noticed several occasions over the past few months when the water bottle she keeps at work tasted like urine, the complaint said.

The incidents started after the woman told Cruz Perez, her co-worker, that she only wanted to be friends after he expressed a romantic interest in her, authorities say.

Cruz Perez initially denied tampering with the woman’s water bottle when deputies first interviewed him about the allegations, but later admitted to once urinating in the container after investigators suggested they might conduct DNA testing on the bottle, the complaint said.

Cruz Perez said he had to go to the bathroom when the incident occurred but that the restaurant was too busy at the time for him to use the facilities, authorities say.

He added that he forgotten to throw away the water bottle after relieving himself in it, according to the complaint.

The woman told investigators that she noticed a taste of urine in the bottle about 15 times over the past several months.

Cruz Perez made his first appearance on the charges last week.

His attorney, Adriel Benjamin Villarreal, said his client had not yet entered a plea in the case.

“We haven’t made any decisions at this point,” Villarreal said.

He declined to comment on the allegations made against his client.

Cruz Perez could not be immediately reached for comment.

His criminal record consists of a handful of parking tickets.

A manager at Perkins said Cruz Perez previously worked as a baker at the restaurant but was fired immediately following the allegations.

His next court appearance is scheduled to take place March 28.