When police first arrived at the apartment in St. Paul’s Lowertown early Saturday morning, officers smelled fresh gunpowder and heard a man screaming, “I’m dying, I’m dying.”
When they walked inside, they saw an interior door sprayed with about 20 bullet holes. A woman lay face down in the living room without a pulse. She was bleeding from her side.
Also inside was the man who lived in the apartment, Scott Alan Klund, 29. He was lying about fifteen feet inside the door, propped up on his left side. When police asked if he’d been shot, he laughed and said, “I’m not the one who got shot.”
That is part of the account included in a criminal complaint filed in Ramsey County District Court on Tuesday charging Klund with one count each of second-degree murder and second-degree attempted murder.
The former Marine opened fire with an assault rifle on a man and a woman he invited back to his apartment. They had met at a St. Paul gas station after bar close Saturday morning, the complaint said.
After one officer escorted him to his squad car during his arrest, Klund smiled and winked at him, the complaint said.
Klund’s mother, Charlene Klund, said Tuesday that the family is “still trying to figure out what is going on” and had no further comment.
Officers went to the apartment building at 250 E. Fifth St. after receiving reports of gunfire in the building about 3:30 a.m. Saturday. Klund also called 911 and said he’d shot a man and was trying to keep him alive inside his apartment, according to the criminal complaint.
Charlotte Ann Rawls, 52, was found slain inside Klund’s residence. Paramedics took the wounded man to Regions Hospital, where he was to be treated for what appeared to be injuries that were not life-threatening. His identity has not been released.
SUSPECT’S ACCOUNT
During questioning by police, Klund allegedly said he had been drinking at The Bulldog bar in Lowertown until closing time. He said he ran into the man, whom police later found wounded in his apartment, at SuperAmerica after he left the bar, the complaint said.
Klund told police he gave the man some money and that the man followed him back to his apartment and eventually tried to steal his computer, which prompted him to fire a “warning shot.” He later changed his story and said he’d invited the man and woman back to his place for drinks. Then he said the man went for his computer and things “took a turn for the worse,” the complaint said.
Throughout much of his conversation with police, Klund said his recollection of what transpired was hazy. When asked what had happened to the woman who’d been with the other man, Klund initially said she had left his apartment.
When pushed for more information, he eventually said, “I killed her, didn’t I? I (expletive) killed her,” the complaint said.
Klund went on to say that the shooting took place because he’d felt threatened. He often used military jargon to describe the events to officers, talking of “force escalation tactics” and “rules of engagement” to describe his behavior.
He told officers he owned a 9mm Springfield XD as well as a Bushmaster 5.56 Adaptive Combat rifle, which he typically keeps locked under his bed.
At some point, he told police he recalled sitting on the bathroom floor with the wounded man, assuring him that he wasn’t going to die before calling 911.
SURVIVOR’S ACCOUNT
When police were finally able to interview the wounded man, he told officers he and Rawls had been outside SuperAmerica early Saturday when Klund came out of the store with two bags of chips.
He then said Klund struck up a conversation with them and he eventually asked Klund for a cigarette.
He and Rawls followed him to his apartment building, where he said Klund invited them in.
Once inside, the man told police he went to the bathroom while Rawls sat on the couch. When the man emerged, he asked Klund for a shot of alcohol and went back to the bathroom to grab a towel to wipe off a glass, the complaint said.
That’s when the man told officers he was shot in the arm. When he looked up, he said he saw Klund in the upper bedroom loft area holding a black rifle.
The man ran into the bathroom and locked the door. While barricaded inside, he said he heard several shots fired outside the door. The gunfire eventually was directed toward the bathroom, the man told police.
At one point, the man jumped into the bathtub for better protection. The gunshots continued, the complaint said. The man said he was struck in the forearm and thigh before Klund forced his way into the bathroom and cut his throat and face with a knife.
He denied trying to steal Klund’s computer or threatening him.
“I DID”
Klund called police and told them a man in his apartment had “a cut throat and had been shot multiple times,” the complaint said.
When asked who shot him, Klund said, “I did,” according to the complaint.
After later obtaining a search warrant, investigators found a black assault rifle. It did not have a single bullet left in it, the complaint said.
Bullet holes and casings were found throughout the unit, with some 23 casings by the bathroom floor and five bullet holes in the wall behind Rawls’ body. They also found a knife on the bathroom sink.
Hanging on the bedroom wall was Klund’s framed honorable discharge from the United States Marines.
Rawls was shot in the head and upper arm and thorax area. It was that shot that extensively damaged her heart and lungs, causing her to die from blood loss, the Ramsey County Medical Examiner’s Office reported.
A FAMILY GRIEVES
Athena Lund, 30, the younger of Rawls’ two daughters, said she had plans to see her mom the day after she died, on Mother’s Day.
“She was supposed to come over and just hang out. We were going to go to dinner and go through some of her own jewelry,” Lund said.
Instead, a police officer showed up at her house to tell her that her mom was dead.
Lund, who is also a mother, said she is angry and sad about what’s happened. After noting Klund military history, she said: “My question is … who was responsible for his mental status and making sure he was OK?”
“VERY TRUSTING PERSON”
Rawls grew up in North Carolina and moved to Minnesota many years ago, Lund said. Her family eventually followed. Rawls has two siblings.
While she used to work for a dry cleaner, Lund said an injury to her mother’s ankle made it difficult for her to stand for long periods of time, leaving her unemployed in recent years. She said the metal rod that had been inserted into her mom’s ankle several years ago had started to deteriorate.
She’d also recently lost her apartment and had been staying with various friends, mostly in St. Paul, while she waited for her Social Security application to be processed, Lund said.
Police described her as homeless.
More than anything, Lund said, she’ll remember her mom’s smile and her unrivaled ability to make friends with “all kinds of people.”
It was likely her friendly personality that led her mom to Klund’s apartment the night she was killed, Lund suspected.
“My mom was a very trusting person, she saw the good in everybody… She didn’t ever think anything like this could happen to her,” Lund said.
Lund’s family has set up a GoFundMe page to try to raise money to cover the costs of Rawls’ funeral. The link can be found at bit.ly/1ZBB4fd
A MARINE CORPORAL
Klund reached the rank of corporal while serving with the Marine Corps from May 2007 to May 2011, according to military records.
He was deployed three times, once to Afghanistan for just over six months in 2008 and then to the Philippines and Thailand in 2010. He received the Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Global War on Terror Service Medal and others.
Klund was enrolled as a pre-business and biology student at Metropolitan State University last spring.
Before that he attended the University of Minnesota-Duluth and the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities campuses.
Klund’s criminal record in Minnesota includes only convictions for traffic violations.
Klund was denied a public defender at his first court appearance on the charges Tuesday. His bail was set for $1 million. No other attorney was listed for him in court records.
His next hearing is scheduled for May 17.
