Murder and Homicide

Aaron Schaffhausen pleads guilty to killing daughters, but says he was insane

Yesterday, Aaron Schaffhausen pleaded guilty to brutally murdering his three daughters last July in the River Falls home they lived in with their mother.SEE ALSO: Edina Realty won't sell house where Aaron Schaffhausen allegedly killed his three girls But Schaffhausen maintains he was insane and want ... More >>

Nick Brady, Little Falls teen killed by Byron Smith, linked to two burglaries at Smith's home

After he was charged with second-degree murder in connection with the grisly Thanksgiving killings of Little Falls teens Nick Brady and Haile Kifer in his home, Byron Smith claimed that he was the victim of eight burglaries in recent years accounting for tens of thousands of dollars in stolen items. ... More >>

Byron Smith faces murder charges

Plus, Governor Dayton doesn't want to relax marijuana laws, Strib journalists want raises

Samuel Taylor's murder trial in cabbie shooting begins today

See Also: Minneapolis Murder Map 2012 COVER: The View From Down Here The murder trial for a 20-year-old accused of killing a north Minneapolis cabbie in a robbery gone wrong begins today in Hennepin County. Last Thursday, a grand jury brought indictments of first- and second-degree murder for S ... More >>

Jawon Osburn identified as latest juvenile homicide victim

​Jawon Osburn has been named as the 16-year-old victim of a gunshot homicide that happened Monday night.Osburn, identified by the Hennepin County Medical Examiner, was found shot on the 2900 block of Dupont Avenue, and declared dead on the scene after paramedics were unable to resuscitate him. Osb ... More >>

Brian Nelson identified as homicide victim in downtown stabbing

​Brian Nelson, a 20-year-old from St. Paul, has been identified as the victim of a fatal stabbing in a downtown parking ramp. Nelson and another man were stabbed in the early morning hours on Monday, after an altercation with a third man.Police were called to the scene to stop a fight at the Ramp ... More >>

Jonathan Rubio-Segura guilty of murder, manslaughter in drunken fight

Jonathan Rubio-Segura is a murderer, at least according to Hennepin County jurors.​Jurors deliberated for five hours before deciding Jonathan Rubio-Segura's fate in his murder trial this afternoon. The verdict: guilty. Rubio-Segura was hanging out in downtown Minneapolis last spring, drunk, when ... More >>

Damone Williams-Tillman arrested in Mankato murder

Williams-Tillman, 19, is held pending charges of 2nd-degree murder.​Damone Williams-Tillman was arrested Saturday on suspicion of killing Josselyn Bishop, 19, a Mankato State University student.Bishop, a native of Henderson, had been the victim of multiple stab wounds. Her body was found by a road ... More >>

Byron Brantley left trail of guns after Born's Bar homicide

​Byron Brantley, Leandrews Miller and Xavier Buckhanan have all been charged in connection with the murder of Trevell Glass early Wednesday morning outside Born's Bar in St. Paul. Brantley, the suspected triggerman in the shooting, made it easy for the cops to track him down: He left a trail ... More >>

Alfunda Scruggs killed Michael Fonta for insulting "my bitch"

Alfunda Scruggs, left, is headed for prison. Hope Jackson remains jailed on $1 million bond.​High on crack at his apartment last February, Alfunda Jackson didn't take kindly to his girlfriend, Hope Jackson, being called a bitch by his roommate, Michael Fonta. "She's my bitch and I'm the only one ... More >>

Phil Jensen, S.D. lawmaker, offers bill justifying homicide against abortion providers

S.D. Rep. Phil Jensen says this is all a misunderstanding.​A bill that could make murdering an abortion provider a justifiable homicide was apparently this close to becoming law in neighboring South Dakota. But Phil Jensen, the Rapid City Republican and avid abortion rights opponent who authored ... More >>

Kenneth Lee Johnson sentenced in Anthony Titus's murder

​Anthony Titus was 16 years old when he was gunned down in an alley near Fremont Avenue N. last Fourth of July, the city's 26th homicide of the year. Minneapolis police say he and his friends were "mean mugged" by some gang-bangers in an SUV because one of the guys hanging out with Titus was ... More >>

Leonard Bernard Baker sentenced in James Teto Grant's shovel-beating murder

James Teto Grant was murdered last summer.​Seventeen-year-old Leonard B. Baker will spend the next 23 years of his life in prison after pleading guilty in January to beating another teenager to death with a shovel in Wirth Park last summer. He was sentenced today. James Teto Grant's decomposi ... More >>

Brian Coyle Center shooting leaves two Somali men wounded

Ahmednur Ali was shot and killed at the Brian Coyle Center in Sept. 2008​A drive-by shooting outside Brian Coyle Community Center last night left two Somali men wounded and rekindled fears about gang violence. Neither the victims nor the suspects have been named by police. One of the injured ... More >>

Arnold Darwin Waukazo: murder suspect was in romantic relationship with Krissy Bates

Arnold Darwin Waukazo is accused of killing Krissy Bates.​Arnold Darwin Waukazo, the Blaine man being held in jail on suspicion of murdering transgender woman Krissy Bates, was in some kind of romantic relationship with the victim. Police have been told that Waukazo was dating Krissy Bates. ... More >>

Ryan Eugene Loyd sentenced in 16-year-old Anthony Titus's murder

Ryan Eugene Loyd​Anthony Titus had just turned 16 years old when he was shot dead on the night of the Fourth of July in a backyard on the 2900 block of Fremont Avenue North. Family and friends said they were sure the boy wasn't in a gang, and that the shooting wasn't gang-related. As Minneapol ... More >>

'90s Minneapolis punk doc 'When We Play for Real' screening on MTN

City Pages file photoBob Murderer of the Murderers​In the late '90s, when bands like Dillinger Four, Code 13, and the Strike were ruling the local punk scene, filmmaker Patti Rhodes set out to make a documentary about Minneapolis punk rock. The resulting one-hour film, Debasement Video Fanzine, Vo ... More >>

Rachel Reeves's murder charges dropped after sitter flees to Mexico

Hennepin County JailRachel Reeves is off the hook for murder--but maybe not for long.​Rachel Reeves was supposed to go to trial yesterday on charges that she killed her 15-month old, Julia Leigh Rivera, two years ago. But when a key witness--the babysitter who was with the little girl when she sto ... More >>

Chase Boruch, U of W student, war veteran, accused of killing his mom

Chase Boruch is accused of killing his mother for money.​Chase Boruch had already been through the ringer. But to the rest of the world, it looked as though the 24-year-old Iraq War veteran had managed to avoid the mental health roulette endemic to the conflict--returning home, starting college, a ... More >>

Michael Swanson charged with killing for cash and cigarettes

After he was booked, Swanson smiled for reporters.​Michael Richard Swanson smiled for the cameras during his perp walk Tuesday in Algona, Iowa. It's hard to see why the 17-year-old from St. Louis Park would take two counts of first-degree murder so lightly. If he's convicted, he'll spend the ... More >>

Amecio Navro Enge now charged with killing El Mio Ju Johnson

​Minneapolis police arrested and charged Amecia Navro Enge with second degree murder in October, alleging he intentionally ran over Maurice Meeks in a fit of rage. Now Enge faces a second murder charge. The Hennepin County Medical Examiner says that a second man, El Mio Ju Johnson, died from ... More >>

Mahdi Hassan Ali to be tried as adult in Seward triple homicide

Mahdi Hassan Ali's dental records proved key for prosecutors.​Mahdi Hassan Ali will be tried as an adult for his role in January's triple homicide at a Somali market on East Franklin Avenue. Hennepin County District Judge Peter Cahill set up that scenario when he ruled late yesterday that Ali ... More >>

Leonard Bernard Baker is second teen charged in James Teto Grant's death

​The way his two accused teenage killers tell the story to police, James Teto Grant went to Theodore Wirth Park on July 10 of his own free will to be initiated into a gang. When he got there, he was instead beaten to death with a shovel. One of his legs was tied to a stolen car battery and he ... More >>

Wis. teen stomped to death for his Air Jordan sneakers

Photo by chrishimself​Lorenzo McKittrick was walking back to him foster parent's home last weekend when he ran into Ke'Andre Frazier in an alley behind a Madison-area shopping center. The 16-year-old let Frazier borrow his cell phone before the 17-year-old started fighting him and kicking him to t ... More >>

Milutin Vukmir hacks at blind landlord with axe in eviction argument

Vukmir faces attempted homicide charges​Let it it be said that 74-yera-old Milutin Vukmir is not an axe murderer, but it sounds like he came perilously close to earning the title on Saturday when he attacked his blind landlord in Kenosha. His beef? He was being evicted. This, evidently, was t ... More >>

Woman shot dead in North Minneapolis

​Minneapolis police report overnight that one woman was shot dead and another was wounded in the 1300 block of Logan Ave. N. at about 2:30 a.m. The dead victim's identity is not yet available and will be released by the Hennepin County Medical Examiners Office. The wounded woman was transp ... More >>

The Crucifixion of Juarez

On the front line of the U.S. war on drugs, a Mexican city bleeds to death

Ahmed Shire Ali avoids murder rap in Seward Market slayings

​Ahmed Shire Ali, one of two men charged with murder in January's bloodbath at the Seward Market on Franklin Avenue, pleaded guilty today to lesser charges in Hennepin County Court: Attempted aggravated robbery. He faces a maximum of 18 years behind bars. Ahmed Ali says his accomplice, Mahdi ... More >>

Franklin Anthony Chosa guilty in murder of Carlos Trevino

​One of the men charged in the fatal beating in South Minneapolis last year has been found guilty of second-degree murder. Franklin Anthony Chosa, 26, and his cousin, Jeffrey Robert Chosa, were charged with beating Carlos Trevino Jr. to death with their fists June 25 outside a party on the 2600 b ... More >>

Cornell Deangelo Roberson charged with attempted murder in Route 22 bus shooting

The shootings took place on the night of Feb. 27 as the bus was headed north on Humboldt Avenue at 48th Avenue with about a dozen riders aboard.

Alfunda Scruggs smoked crack with Michael Fonta then killed him, police say

Scruggs beat him with his fists and strangled him with a cord before stabbing him in the neck, killing him, police say.

Tax fraud gone wrong leads to robbery, shooting death

It appears that last week's fatal shooting of Orlando Nunn stemmed from anger over a botched IRS fraud, and it doesn't count as the 7th murder in Minneapolis this year.

Two teenagers each held on $3M bond in Seward triple homicide

Police say Mahdi Hassan Ali was the gunman and Ahmed Shire Ali was his accomplice in a robbery attempt.

Man arrested in St. Paul's first homicide of 2010

Police aren't saying whether the shooting death was intentional, but the men grew up together and were friends, according to a neighbor.

Man arrested, officers identified, in St. Paul shooting

The St. Paul police have arrested one man for allegedly shooting another dead late Monday. And looks like the man police shot and killed Tuesday was not the killer.

Wisconsin quadruple murder suspect found dead

Tyrone Adair, the subject of a massive manhunt after his two daughters and their mothers were found murdered, was found dead Monday.

Charges filed in June homicide

Criminal charges were filed today in the June 11 shooting death of Vincent Glover.

Only in Wisconsin: Mom allegedly helped son burn his girlfriend's corpse

A Wisconsin mom is accused of helping her 36-year-old son dispose of his girlfriend's body after he strangled her to death.

Guilty verdict in Somali slaying

Hassan Mohamed Abdillahi has been convicted of killing 21-year-old Abdishakur Adan Hassan at a Somali Mall last fall.

Craig Newmark speaks at victim's memorial in wake of Craigslist killings

Besieged by politicians and media, Craig Newmark finds an unlikely ally: A victim's family

Gagne case: Victim's family says charges would be 'inhumane'

The death of a 97-year-old man thrown to the floor by wrestling legend Verne Gagne was ruled a homicide.

Swedish hip-hop artist charged with murder of ex-Twin Cities jazz musician

Minneapolis Somali community facing dark web of murders

They came to escape civil war, so why are they killing each other in the streets?

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'Biggie and Tupac' charts the hits on a notorious heavy and an urban guerrilla

The Remains of the Day

Buffy Sedlachek's Tamarack combs a crime scene for clues into human nature

The Five Deaths of Carmen McNeal