SPENCER, Tenn. — The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation has issued an Endangered Child Alert for three young children authorities believe were taken by their non-custodial parents and could be on their way to Minnesota.

The TBI says 6-year-old Analia Essex, 2-year-old Abigail Christian and 1-year-old Michale Christian went missing under suspicious circumstances Tuesday. They are believed to be with their parents, Amanda Essex and Michale Darrel Christian, who are not legally allowed to have the children.

The bureau said the children and their parents were last seen near Van Buren County and may be traveling to Minnesota in a white SUV. Michale Darrel Christian previously lived in the Motley and Staples area in central Minnesota, public records indicate.

The agency is asking anyone with information to call 800-TBI-FIND.

Wanting to get some sun and an even tan, Michelle Bennett removed her top as she visited the Park Point beach with some friends on June 26.

It wasn’t long, she said, before another woman approached her, asking her to cover up. The woman, who Bennett estimated to 60 or 70 feet away with her family, said her kids were uncomfortable.

A half-hour later, a Duluth police officer was on scene, asking Bennett to put her top back on.

“He told me it wasn’t a nude beach,” Bennett said. “I said no one here is nude.”

Bennett’s story, which she later shared on social media, set off a debate over the legality of women going topless on Minnesota beaches and other public spaces.

Bennett ultimately covered up, and was not arrested or cited. She contended state law does not prohibit the practice.

“I don’t really understand how you can be that offended,” Bennett said. “I was kind of traumatized by the whole ordeal.”

Police spokeswoman Ingrid Hornibrook also confirmed that Bennett was not cited, but maintained that it remains illegal for women to be topless in public. She noted that a different statute defines nudity as including a woman’s breasts.

Hornibrook said officers occasionally receive similar complaints, with two citations issued last year.

“It’s one of those things where if someone is calling because they feel uncomfortable or unsafe — not that anyone felt unsafe in this case — but that’s the point where we would step in,” she said. “If someone in the community is trying to enjoy a public asset and is feeling uncomfortable, we need to intervene.”

But Minnesota law is not particularly clear on the issue.

Under state statute, a person is guilty of indecent exposure when he or she “willfully and lewdly exposes the person’s body, or the private parts thereof.” If someone under the age of 16 is present, the crime is a gross misdemeanor.

Bennett said she has routinely gone topless at Park Point over the past several years, but never before had the police called on her. She said there was nothing lewd or obscene about her behavior, and said she was left feeling as though her “body was being policed.”

“I wasn’t doing anything wrong,” she said. “I was just laying there on the ground.”

Topless sunbathing apparently is not a crime in any of Minnesota’s neighboring states, including Wisconsin, where the state’s obscenity law specifically applies only to the “genitals and pubic area.”

The website GoTopless.org, which advocates for women to have the freedom go without a top in public, identifies Minnesota as one of 14 states with “ambiguous” laws. Most states allow women to go topless, the site reports, with only three having a clear ban.

Prior cases have drawn public attention. In Minneapolis, a 23-year-old woman was arrested for going topless at a Minnesota United soccer game in 2017. However, the Minneapolis City Attorney’s Office later dropped the gross misdemeanor charge of indecent exposure, citing “prosecutorial discretion,” according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

The fact that Bennett was not issued a citation should not be taken as a sign that the practice is legal, Hornibrook said. Officers often use discretion in those situations, she said.

“The officer had a conversation with her and developed a rapport, and she did comply on her own,” she said. “He wasn’t going to arrest her and cause even more of a scene.”

But Bennett said the issue amounts to a clear double standard between men and women, and noted that the law could be particularly ambiguous when applied in cases involving transgender people.

She said she’d like to receive a clear assurance that no one would be arrested or prosecuted for going topless. That, however, would appear unlikely unless there is a successful legal challenge or legislative act further defining indecent exposure.

“The next time someone calls the police, I want the person on the other end of the phone to say, ‘You need to leave them alone and stop harassing them,'” Bennett said.

Ramsey County debated a draft of its depute body camera policy this week — and the most spirited topic was the same issue that nearly prevented such policies from progressing through the Legislature years ago.

It involved a citizen’s rights in their private home — particularly on a non-emergency call. Specifically, whether there’s any right to have the camera turned off.

At the county board Tuesday — following a public input session in which nobody showed up — Sheriff Bob Fletcher teed up his draft policy, and said he was open to the issue.

The policy currently requires officers to turn on their cameras when “dispatched to or investigating any call or incident.” In fact, it requires them to start recording before arriving on-scene, and remain on, in most instances, “until the incident has concluded.”

There are some exceptions, including recording undercover officers and confidential informants, or “at any location where a reasonable expectation of privacy exists, such as a bathroom or locker room.”

But the county debate — much like debate at the Legislature three years ago — wasn’t about those listed exceptions.

CONSENT ISSUES

Back in the spring of 2016, the Legislature had strong differences of opinion about body cameras — and citizen privacy in particular.

Three separate bills, headed by the chairs of three powerful committees, were in play. And all looked like long-shots — primarily due to of disagreement over citizen consent for filming in private homes.

One of the bills was sponsored by House data practices committee chair Peggy Scott, an Andover Republican, whose personal information was improperly accessed during the drivers license data debacle.

Scott had privacy concerns, to say the least. She wanted police to get citizen consent on private property, except in “exigent circumstances.”

The possibility of everything from tax forms on a coffee table to embarrassing details during a medical call being put into a digital vault scared those concerned with government overreach.

“I think it runs into Fourth Amendment issues if they’ve got a camera rolling in your house, especially if there’s a (police) partner walking around while the other’s talking to you … How is that not a search?” Scott said.

The examples became more extreme: How about a messy domestic incident? Would citizens worry about their neighbors, or an ex-spouse involved in a custody dispute, potentially getting a hold of that footage?

Despite assurances that that wouldn’t be possible, would they even call at all?

A NON-STARTER FOR SOME

But the concept of consent was a non-starter for Rep. Tony Cornish, R-Vernon Center, who chaired the House’s public safety committee.

“All law enforcement together said in unison said they can’t stomach consent,” Cornish said, adding that any such provision would put an officer in an on-the-spot bind trying to figure out who home owners are, and whether there are circumstances demanding they film anyway.

“Plus, the way things are today, turning the camera off would give birth to conspiracies … There’s no way the officer would be protected.”

Scott lost that fight.

Even among critics, the Legislature’s bills put allies at odds.

Civil libertarians wanting privacy — not just from nosy neighbors, but from police —  found themselves arguing against watchdog groups wanting more accountability for law enforcement. The entire impetus behind body camera legislation arose from a desire to watch the watchmen — and the less officers could legally turn a camera off, the better, the latter group argued.

Both groups distrusted police. But that distrust led them to opposite conclusions.

But the sponsor of the third bill, Senate judiciary chair Ron Latz, DFL-St. Louis Park, sided with privacy advocates.

“Community organizations look at the big picture, but that may conflict with the agenda of an individual who is on a recording,” Latz said at the time. “I’d rather leave it in the hands of the individual.”

In the end, a compromise bill was reached. The general public could see body-camera footage only if an officer in it discharges a firearm or causes someone substantial bodily harm.

And anyone in the footage can choose to get a copy and make it public if they wish, after active investigations are done, and after anyone in the video who doesn’t want to be seen — other than a police officer — gets an option to blur their image.

RAMSEY COUNTY DEBATE

Flash forward to Tuesday, and it’s déjà vu all over again.

The county board debate centered largely on whether someone reporting a crime in their own home in a non-emergency situation can require a deputy to turn off their camera when walking through their front door.

Someone reporting a burglary, for example.

“There are people who won’t want to call us if they have to be on body camera when they’re making their report,” Fletcher told commissioners. “Or some of their friends or relatives won’t want to stay there as witnesses.”

Commissioner Rafael Ortega said: “My concern is that people won’t call.”

Flecther agreed with Ortega.

“I can see both sides of the issue to be frank with you,” he said. “I don’t like the concept of recording the interior of people’s houses when there’s no law enforcement reason to be there aside from taking the report.”

Commissioner Victoria Reinhardt voiced concern for deputies. What if someone said they wanted to make a standard report, but it was actually a set-up?

Also, if making a standard report, could it simply be done over the phone? Or in a squad car, perhaps?

“To me it’s a slippery slope. There are ways that you don’t have to allow somebody to be in your home to be on videotape,” Reinhardt said.

“I’m not sure that not having an officer have face-to-face contact is necessarily where we want community policing to go either,” Fletcher responded. “Let’s agree we’ll move ahead the way it is, and in six months we’ll reevaluate.”

As it stands, the county policy — which is identical to St. Paul’s policy — does not include citizen consent. Though it does give some latitude to deputies.

“Deactivation may be the best option if the situation is not adversarial and a (body camera) inhibits a victim or witness from providing information,” it notes.

REVIEWING VIDEO

There was a final issue three years ago important enough to prompt then-Gov. Mark Dayton to balk at signing the bill at all.

It’s an issue Ramsey County, along with St. Paul, have decided not to validate.

At the tail-end of the Legislative session, Dayton called for — and finally received — a change that police watchdog groups had been pleading for.

It’s something that many people would overlook as minute, but which the ACLU and local NAACP chapters saw as a deal breaker: a mandate that officers be allowed to review video footage before writing reports.

Law enforcement interests argued such a practice would only improve accuracy — but watchdog groups saw it as spoiling the independent evidentiary value of such written reports in court, as well as a double standard against defendants who didn’t get to review footage before making statements of their own.

During an end-stretch committee meeting on the bill, a representative of Minnesota’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension — the agency often charged with investigating fatal police shootings — testified that they didn’t like officers getting an early look at videos, either.

The last-minute change left decisions about “prior review” to local departments, rather than solidifying it in state law.

The Ramsey County policy, like St. Paul’s, clearly allows officers prior review, “including but not limited to report writing.” Fletcher said in an interview he supports it because of  “(reporting) accuracy for certain, but also in respect to the officer’s rights.”

The board on Tuesday authorized a purchase of the cameras and implementation cost of $1.4 million, of which $300,000 goes toward added personnel costs for maintaining and analyzing the data.

An additional policy relating to body camera use in jails — which commissioners noted dealt with separate issues — will be drafted at a later date, and include additional public hearings.

A Minnesota state trooper was charged Wednesday with sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl.

Shawn Gerald Barta, 36, of Burnsville, was charged with first-degree and second-degree criminal sexual conduct, according to a complaint filed Wednesday in Dakota County District Court.

The teen, who is cognitively delayed and functions at about a sixth-grade level, regularly spent time at Barta’s house, according to the complaint.

The complaint gave the following details about the ongoing sexual assault:

The teen told her grandmother that she had been going into a “locked room” with Barta and that they would undress and he would touch her “down there.”

The grandmother told the father who called Burnsville police on Sunday.

When interviewed, the teen told authorities Barta “has been touching me in not good places” over the past year during the weeks she was at his house.

The complaint said the girl was regularly at Barta’s house and that he first began touching her after she had a root canal last spring. Records show the root canal appointment was in May 2018.

The teen said Barta continued assaulting her on a regular basis with the most recent incident occurring on July 2.

According to the complaint, Barta also showed her pornographic videos. The girl said he was “showing her so that she would know what to do.”

Siblings and stepsiblings in the house said they noticed the girl and Barta missing several times and later realized the two had been alone in Barta’s bedroom, the complaint said.

When police interviewed Barta, he said he had been alone with the girl in his bedroom when she was “hiding” from her siblings. He said he had shut the door so they would have a more difficult time finding her, according to the complaint.

Col. Matt Langer, chief of the Minnesota State Patrol released the following statement by email Wednesday:

“The alleged conduct outlined in this complaint is extremely disturbing and completely inconsistent with the core values of the Minnesota State Patrol. Mr. Barta has been placed on investigative leave pending the outcome of the criminal process and an internal affairs investigation.”

A man and woman from Burnsville face felony charges after police seized nearly 300 grams of heroin and almost $197,000 in cash from a residence on Monday.

Kevin Termell Green, 35, and Minnie Kokiesha Loyd, 34, each face a felony first-degree controlled substance charge. Green was charged with another first-degree felony count for having a prior conviction.

Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom announced the charges on Wednesday.

“We are pleased that this investigation has led to the seizure of a significant quantity of this extremely dangerous and addictive drug, thereby keeping this heroin off the streets,” Backstrom said.

Authorities conducted a search warrant on Monday morning at a Burnsville residence rented by Loyd, according to criminal complaints.

Officers located heroin and large amounts of cash throughout the residence. They also found digital scales, plastic baggies, gloves and a money counter.

Green and Loyd made their first appearance in court on Wednesday. A Dakota County District judge set Green’s bail at $750,000 and Loyd’s bail at $500,000.

Green’s next court appearance is on Aug. 1 in Hastings. Loyd’s next court appearance is on Aug. 7 in Hastings.

A Maple Grove woman was charged Wednesday with setting a St. Anthony apartment complex on fire last week.

Cierra Queen Johnson, 31, was charged with one count of first-degree felony arson and one count of first-degree felony burglary, according to a criminal complaint filed Wednesday.

The complaint, filed in Ramsey County District Court, contained the following details:

Around 2:45 a.m. July 5, officers responded to reports of a fire on the third floor of the Equinox Apartments at 2804 Silver Lane in St. Anthony.

The building was evacuated while firefighters put out the fire.

A woman who called police said after a noise woke her, she noticed smoke in her apartment. When she opened her door, she saw flames. She grabbed her child and ran through the flames to escape.

The woman told authorities that her roommate had been threatened by Johnson several times in the days leading up to the fire through phone calls, Facebook messages and video calls, according to the complaint. The roommate was in a romantic relationship with the father of Johnson’s child.

Johnson threatened to burn the apartment complex down if the roommate didn’t end the relationship, according to the complaint.

Surveillance video at the nearby Cub store showed Johnson walking out of the store with two cans of lighter fluid in her hands about ten minutes before the fire broke out, according to the complaint. A store receipt shows that a lighter had been purchased in addition to the lighter fluid. Johnson paid in cash and showed her I.D. that contained her birth date.

After Johnson was arrested, she told authorities she thought she had to show her I.D. to purchase the items. She also told authorities she was initially going to set the roommates car on fire or pop its tires but when she couldn’t locate the car, she started the apartment on fire, according to the complaint.

When asked why she had started the fire, Johnson said she did it because she was “fed up and wanted to be left alone.” She said she didn’t think anyone was in the apartment because she had been told “nobody had been there for a few days.”

She said she wanted to light the apartment on fire “just a little bit” so they knew “she wasn’t playing,” according to the complaint. She denied it was her intent to hurt anyone and said it didn’t occur to her that others could be hurt by her actions.

Johnson has two prior felony convictions.

A suspected impaired driver does not have a limited right to get legal advice before deciding whether to submit to a blood test if police have a search warrant, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled Wednesday.

But the decision was met with dissent from three of the court’s seven justices, who said that even if police have a warrant, a driver could be confused about the legal ramifications of taking a blood test and should have the right to an attorney.

The decision comes in the case of a woman arrested on suspicion of drunken driving in 2017 in Dakota County. A deputy got a warrant for a blood sample, as required by law, and told her that refusal to comply would be a crime. The test showed the woman was over the legal limit for driving, but she tried to get those results tossed out because she wasn’t given the chance to talk with a lawyer.

In prior case law, the Supreme Court has held that accused people have the right to legal counsel at all critical stages of a prosecution, including pretrial procedures that could impair the defense. Prior case law says that a request for alcohol concentration testing under the implied-consent law is a critical stage, and that drivers have a limited right to consult with an attorney before submitting to a blood test.

But this case is different, the majority found, because police had a warrant — which is now required for blood or urine tests under updates to the implied-consent law. The implied-consent law also was updated to make test refusal a crime.

The majority found that a motorist has a choice of complying with a search warrant or being subjected to criminal penalties, and “we have never held that the Minnesota Constitution provides the subject of a search warrant with the right to consult counsel before a warrant can be executed.”

Justice Natalie Hudson, writing for the dissent, disagreed, saying that the majority opinion means police can deprive drivers of the limited right to counsel whenever they get a search warrant for chemical testing. She said the mere presence of a search warrant doesn’t alleviate concerns.

“Drivers will still be left without guidance about the legal ramifications of their decision and will still have to make a critical and binding decision that will affect them in a subsequent DWI prosecution,” Hudson wrote.

Minneapolis police are seeking the public’s help in identifying a man involved in a stabbing last month.

The suspect is described as an Native American or Hispanic male wearing a grey baseball hat, light wash jeans, and a red T-shirt. He has tattoos on his left arm and stomach.

Police responded to an assault report near 2001 Nicollet Ave. S. about 8 p.m. June 17 and found a man with slash wounds to the arm and stomach. The man was taken to Hennepin County Medical Center by ambulance.

Witnesses said the suspect was shouting racial slurs at the victim before and during the assault. He fled the area before police arrived.

Anyone with information is encouraged to contact CrimeStoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477) or www.crimestoppersmn.org.  All Tips are anonymous and persons providing information leading to an arrest may be eligible for a financial reward.

A Michigan man has been sentenced to nearly four years in prison for repeatedly stalking his ex-girlfriend in Minnesota.

Federal prosecutors say 39-year-old Shawn Thomason of Hazel Park, Michigan, devised a plan to digitally stalk, harm, and abduct his ex-girlfriend.

He drove to Mankato, Minnesota, multiple times and surveilled the woman at her workplace. Prosecutors say he attached GPS trackers to her vehicle and recorded her daily travels to and from her home, and he had lists titled “Tactics” and “Preparations” that included items such as cable ties, cuffs, stun guns and a pistol.

He was arrested in December after he made contact with the woman. He pleaded guilty to interstate stalking in March and was sentenced Wednesday to 45 months in federal prison.

The former owner of a coffee shop in St. Paul was sentenced to 12 years in prison for criminal sexual misconduct.

Eduardo Delariva-Larios, 46, pleaded guilty in May to sexually assaulting a 15-year-old girl last summer who used to work for him.

Delariva-Larios’ attorney asked the judge for a departure, hoping for a lesser sentence.

However, the judge disagreed and sentenced him on Wednesday to 12 years. He will also have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.

“You haven’t shown any empathy for the victim. Sex offenders I’ve seen before think they’ve done nothing wrong, but there is no excuse for your behavior,” Judge Judith Tilsen said to Delariva-Larios at the sentencing.

On July 7, 2018, the teen told police she was working with Delariva-Larios at the coffee shop when he asked her if she had a boyfriend. The conversation then turned sexual, making her uncomfortable, and Delariva-Larios then followed her to the back room of the coffee shop and sexually assaulted her.

Delariva-Larios initially denied any misconduct but later admitted that he had sexual relations with the teen, authorities say. He said it happened after the girl accepted his offer to learn more about her body. He said he apologized to the teen after the assault occurred because he knew it was wrong.

He also was convicted in 2008 of soliciting, inducing and promoting prostitution in Hennepin County.

The prosecuting attorney read aloud a letter from the victim’s mother and grandmother at the sentencing. The letters said that the teen used to be a straight-A student, but has been depressed and anxiety-ridden since the assault and has tried to kill herself multiple times.

“I only hope the person responsible gets the sentence he deserves and pays for what he has done. I never want to see another girl suffering … This has ripped away the dreams of our whole family,” the letter from the victim’s grandmother read.

A 15-year-old boy is in critical condition after a police officer pulled his body from the bottom of a pool at an apartment complex in New Brighton.

He was rushed to Children’s Hospital, where he remained in critical condition as of 10:30 p.m. Thursday, according to Commander Eric Bradt with the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office.

It’s still unclear what preceded the incident or how long the teen may have been underwater, Bradt said.

“We don’t have great witnesses at this point, so we’ll probably have to do further investigation on this,” Bradt said.

New Brighton police were the first to respond to the Garden View apartment building in the northern suburb around 5:30 p.m. after a resident called in to report the drowning.

An officer who was one of the first to arrive on scene jumped in the pool as soon as he saw the boy, Bradt said.

“Without hesitation, he jumped in with his full uniform on,” Bradt said. “Even a few seconds can count in a situation like this.”

The officer dove down 9 feet to reach the boy at the bottom of the outdoor pool and started to render emergency aid as soon as he pulled him out, Bradt continued.

There was no lifeguard on duty at the time, and the fenced-in pool had a message posted to that effect. A citizen who saw the boy attempted to use a life-ring on hand but was unable to reach him at that depth, Bradt said.

Bradt commended those who responded to the scene, including the citizen who called it in. Bradt said he didn’t have any details about the caller.

“Obviously they did the right thing by calling right away, and emergency medical services were on sceve very quickly and again I think that initial officer did a great job,” Bradt said.

The teen’s name was not released.

The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation says three young children who were the subject of an Endangered Child Alert have been found in northern Minnesota.

The bureau said Friday the children were found in Cass County with their non-custodial parents, who have been arrested. The Minnesota Department of Public Safety says someone reported seeing the parents’ vehicle Thursday afternoon, and authorities saw the vehicle in a wooded area near Motley.

Authorities say 6-year-old Analia Essex, 2-year-old Abigail Christian and 1-year-old Michale Christian went missing under suspicious circumstances Tuesday and were believed to be with their parents, who are not legally allowed to have them.

The parents are being held in a Minnesota jail and awaiting extradition to Tennessee on multiple charges. Minnesota authorities are also working to return the children to Tennessee.

Minneapolis Police Inspector Eddie Frizell will become the Metro Transit Police Department’s next chief on Aug. 5.

As chief, Frizell will lead the force of 120 full-time and 60 part-time officers. The department serves seven counties and about 130 transit routes.

Frizell has served as the First Precinct inspector in Minneapolis for two years. He also worked as the chief of police, a SWAT negotiator, an internal affairs investigator and the Fifth Precinct inspector during his 26-year career with the Minneapolis Police Department.

“I look forward to leading the group of law enforcement professionals at the Metro Transit Police Department as we continue to serve our region with respect, professionalism and a commitment to guardianship for our riders, employees and the communities throughout our transit system,” Frizell said in a Friday news release.

A St. Paul man was charged with 10 felonies after federal agents say he stockpiled child pornography and looked at it while he was at work.

Authorities searched William Thomas Costandine, Jr.’s home in late 2016 after learning that the 66-year-old had purchased a DVD depicting sexual images of minors that was manufactured in South Carolina, according to the criminal complaint filed in Ramsey County District Court Thursday.

They found close to 200 DVDs, CDs and videotapes as well as a digital camera, 40 memory cards and two thumb drives containing more than 8,000 illegal images of children, charges say. Additional child pornography was reportedly found on a laptop computer Costandine kept inside a safe on his main floor.

During an interview with agents, Costandine said he obtained the images because he was attracted to children, the complaint said. He denied ever touching a child inappropriately and said he lived at his home on the 400 block of Bay Street alone.

The seized material was sent to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children for review. The organization issued its final report on the content in March, which found that some 300 of the images Costandine possessed depicted child victims known to law enforcement, the complaint said.

Some of the images were viewed on a computer screen inside a room agents later determined to be Costandine’s workplace.

His employer was notified and agents confiscated his work computer for further analysis.

The criminal complaint did not say where Costandine works, and he could not be reached for comment.

No attorney was listed for him in court records.

Costandine was charged via warrant with 10 counts of possession of child pornography and is not yet in custody.

He has no prior criminal record in Minnesota.

A childcare provider in Vadnais Heights faces criminal charges after a two-year-old was badly burned under her care, authorities say.

The toddler needed medical attention to treat a two-centimeter blister that developed on her hand from the burn, as well as blisters on three of her fingers.

The severity of her condition took her mother by surprise when she picked her up from Mary Mork’s in-home daycare last July 18 because Mork, 73, had told her the girl seemed fine and that her injury was minor and didn’t require the woman leaving work early, according to court records.

Also troubling was that Mork couldn’t explain how the burn happened other than to guess the child might have touched a hot bowl of green beans she carried into the basement for lunch, according to court records.

An emergency room physician who treated the girl as well as a doctor with Midwest Children’s Resource Center determined the burn couldn’t have been caused by that scenario and was more likely the result of a “flow burn” from hot liquid, court documents say.

They also said the girl likely would have cried from the injury.

Since the two-year-old didn’t have the language skills to describe what happened, child protection workers interviewed other children at the daycare to piece together what happened.

While none of them could recall seeing the toddler get burned, one of them recalled watching Mork bandage and spray something on the little girl as the child cried in pain, according to the criminal charges.

The Minnesota Department of Human Services indefinitely suspended Mork’s daycare licensing about a week later.

She was charged Friday by the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office with two counts of child neglect.

Mork could not be reached for comment and no attorney was listed for her in court records.

She’s expected to make her first court appearance on the allegations Aug. 6.

Mork has no prior criminal record in Minnesota.

The St. Paul police department says a software company missed three dates to launch an integral program, and now the police chief has told the company they broke the contract.

The department has paid about $720,000 so far for the $1.5 million system, and Police Chief Todd Axtell is saying the company owes them money.

St. Paul police have been working to get a new records management system for five years — it’s the backbone of everything the department does.

“Our first choice was to get this software to work, and if that doesn’t happen, we will do everything we can to make the department whole through the remedies in the contract,” said Assistant Police Chief Robert Thomasser on Friday.

A CentralSquare Technologies vice president, however, wrote that the police department was seeking “additional functionality within the software that it is outside of the original project scope.”

Police and the company have exchanged letters, but it’s not clear what’s going to happen next — the contract is expired, and the police department continues to work with a records management system that’s 20 years old.

‘HUB’ OF THEIR WORK

The St. Paul police records management system is “the hub of all of our systems,” Thomasser said.

It’s the computer program that patrol officers use to type their reports and file them in a department database. Investigators log into the system to access officers’ initial reports, then build cases as they write their own reports about interviews with suspects and witnesses. They use the system to forward cases to prosecutors for charging consideration.

Members of the public also request police reports, which the department accesses from the records management system.

And it’s important because it’s about public safety, transparency and being good stewards of the public’s money, the police department says.

A priority of the police administration is having a new records system that can automatically push out public information to the department’s website. It’s also intended to provide better crime analysis and allow investigators to connect dots between cases.

SYSTEM IS 20 YEARS OLD

St. Paul police built their current records management system about two decades ago and it still works, so “we don’t have to be careless in our decision-making of where we go next,” Thomasser said.

The police department started planning a new records management system in 2014. They spent about two years doing “a deep dive on what our system was capable of doing now and what we needed,” Thomasser said.

The department received bids from various companies and decided on Zuercher Technologies. The company is now owned by CentralSquare Technologies, and they did not respond to requests for comment Friday.

The new records management system was supposed to go live in August 2018, but that date was pushed back until the end of 2018, Thomasser said. The launch date was then set for April, and the system still isn’t ready to roll, Thomasser said this week.

“We can’t make it work to the standards that the company said they could deliver, which would be to the standards that the people of St. Paul would need,” Thomasser said.

But Libby Stengel, CentralSquare vice president of professional services, wrote in a May 1 letter to Thomasser that there were development requirements for the department’s “expanded scope” of the project.

She said the program would be ready to go in March 2020, and additional items requested by the police department would be made available over a one-year period to follow.

CHIEF SAYS CONTRACT WAS BREACHED

Axtell disputed the matter in a May 15 letter to the company, saying “CentralSquare re-characterized many of the functional deficiencies as ‘expanded’ functionality or ‘features.’ … By CentralSquare’s response, a fully functioning system would not be delivered until March 2021.”

He said his letter was notice to CentralSquare that they were “in breach of its warranties and contracts,” and he asked the company to “refund all licensing and maintenance fees” within 30 days.

The police department is still “working with Zuercher to ensure the city is made whole,” Thomasser said Friday. The contract with the company expired July 2.

CentralSquare, which is based in Florida, was formed after several companies — including Zuercher — merged in 2018.

The company serves more than 7,500 organizations with public safety and public administration software, according to its website. Its customers include Los Angeles, Atlanta, Houston and Dallas, the company’s chief executive officer told the Wall Street Journal last month.

RAMSEY COUNTY AGENCIES HAVE TRIED TO FIND SOLUTIONS

Other law enforcement agencies in Ramsey County use Zuercher, and they were hoping to use the system to share information with and from St. Paul when they came on board, said Lt. Kerry Crotty, who oversees the Maplewood Police records department.

The Maplewood department has been using Zuercher software since 2015. “We’ve certainly had our share of issues,” Crotty said.

Patrol officers have told Crotty a traffic stop that would normally take four to five minutes could now last eight minutes. Officers use Zuercher Suite in the laptops in their squad cars — they type in information for citations and print them — but the program “takes longer than we feel that it should,” Crotty said.

Crotty regularly talks with the Ramsey County sheriff’s office, along with police in New Brighton and Mounds View who use the system, and they have tried to come up with solutions.

“We’ve all tried to work with Zuercher to figure out why the system is slow, and they haven’t come up with anything,” Crotty said.

State investigators have identified the five police officers who fired their rifles during a July 2 standoff in Eagan that left a 23-year-old man dead.

The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension released a statement Saturday that Isak Aden of Columbia Heights died from “multiple gunshot wounds.”

The BCA identified the officers who fired as:

Officer Anthony Kiehl of the Bloomington Police Department — six years in law enforcement.

Officer Daniel Nelson of the Bloomington Police Department — 10 years in law enforcement.

Officer Jacob Peterson of the Eagan Police Department — 10 years in law enforcement.

Officer Matt Ryan of the Bloomington Police Department — 11 years in law enforcement.

Officer Adam Stier of the Bloomington Police Department — 12 years in law enforcement.

A handgun and cartridge casing were found next to Aden after he was shot, police said. No one else was injured in the confrontation.

Aden allegedly fled on foot after assaulting a woman in a car in Eagan. Officers tracked him to a wooded area near Highway 13 and Silver Bell Road.

Aden later fled to a parking lot near a business on Seneca Road in Eagan where police said they tried for hours to convince him to surrender. Officers ordered Aden to drop his weapon, but eventually shots were fired and he was hit.

RELATED: Family of man fatally shot by police in Eagan seeks answers

Officers from Apple Valley, Bloomington, Burnsville, Eagan, Edina, Lakeville, the Minnesota State Patrol, Dakota County Sheriff’s Office and South Metro SWAT Team responded to the incident.

The police investigation is ongoing. Aden’s family members have called for police to release more information about the events that led up to his death.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

St. Paul firefighters rescued a person from a residence above the Coffee Cup on the corner of Rice Street and Arlington Avenue after the restaurant caught fire Friday evening.

St. Paul Fire Chief Butch Inks said in a statement that crews arrived on the scene to find heavy smoke and fire on the first floor of the building. A bystander told firefighters a person was trapped on the second floor.

While the first floor blaze was being extinguished, firefighters were able to rescue the trapped resident and make sure no one else was inside the building. The victim was taken to a local hospital, Inks statement said.

The restaurant and residences on the upper floor sustained heavy smoke and fire damage. The Red Cross is assisting two people who were displaced by the fire.

Owners of the Coffee Cup said on Facebook they would work to reopen the restaurant.

“The most important thing is that everyone is safe,” the owners’ post said. “We took over Coffee Cup from Jimmy and Tommy not too long ago, but our heart is in this place and it has been an honor. Please be patient with us while we navigate moving forward. Coffee Cup will be again!”

Just after midnight last week, a 17-year-old unleashed his threats to a room full of people in St. Paul.

He pointed a gun at multiple people in the house where he was drinking, said “I’m gonna shoot” and pressed the gun against a woman’s head, according to a court document. Two people who went outside heard a gunshot at one point.

After the teen ran, a St. Paul police officer and his K-9 joined the search. They found him hiding under a porch nearby in the Payne-Phalen area and officers arrested him without incident.

Another K-9 helped search for the gun, and an officer found a loaded, stolen firearm.

Police say the case demonstrates how K-9s are now being used in St. Paul — under a new policy that’s more restrictive and relies on the dogs to respond only to the most violent offenses.

It has the K-9s focus on tracking and tries to have officers arrest suspects, rather than a dog biting a person to get him into custody. There is also more training and supervision.

The changes happened after a series of high-profile K-9 bites. They culminated last summer with the police chief and mayor pulling back on use of the K-9s until an external audit could be carried out.

Now, police department officials say they’ve implemented 35 of the 39 recommendations from the review.

“We’ve really landed on the notion that our K-9 unit is there to be a locating tool for us, to help maximize both officer and civilian safety … and not as a primary tool for apprehension,” said St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter. “Obviously, in extenuating circumstances, that’s still a possibility, but we don’t want to see our dogs biting someone as a primary tool for apprehension.”

The new policy went into effect at the start of June and will be among the topics that Police Chief Todd Axtell talks about during his annual address to the St. Paul City Council this week.

FOCUS ON K-9s SEARCHING, OFFICERS ARRESTING

Though St. Paul’s police dogs historically were used as locating tools, the independent review of the unit found there was a shift at some point — K-9 tracks of suspects frequently ended with the dog biting people to take them into custody, wrote retired St. Paul Police Chief Bill Finney. Finney conducted the audit that was released in January.

The new policy emphasizes that when a K-9 finds a suspect, officers will try to get the person into handcuffs.

Deputy Police Chief Matt Toupal, who oversees the K-9 unit, said that doesn’t mean the dogs will never physically apprehend a suspect — in other words, bite the person. But the revamped policy is more specific about when they can be used for that purpose.

St. Paul K-9s physically apprehended 23 people per year, on average, between 2012 and 2017.

Since the restrictions were put in place last July, there were no K-9 bites of suspects or otherwise, according to police department statistics. The K-9s also were used more sparingly for tracks and evidence searches, but they likely will be called out more frequently now that the new policy spells out when they can be used.

While previous policy said police dogs had the primary purpose of apprehending felony suspects, the new policy is more limited.

It specifies that K-9s can be used if a person is suspected of murder, aggravated robbery with a gun, kidnapping, sexual assault involving violence, aggravated assault with a gun or weapon that can cause great bodily harm, and some instances of burglary. They can also be used to search if there is an immediate threat of serious physical harm if the person is not immediately detained.

“We’re going to take our K-9s out when we have to and when our community is at risk, all with the purpose of making the community safer,” Toupal said. “We’re not going to be taking these K-9s out for incidents that are not going to put our community at imminent risk.”

COMMUNITY WATCHING CHANGES

Dianne Binns, who was St. Paul NAACP president until earlier this year, said she has heard from community members who think St. Paul should not use police dogs.

Some were previously bitten by K-9s and “they didn’t feel that was an appropriate thing that should have happened to them for street-level and low-level crimes,” Binns said.

Binns reviewed the new policy when the police department was working on it and she said she thinks it’s an improvement to have K-9s focused on the most serious crimes.

She also views the additional training as important. Police dogs and their handlers already received 16 hours a month of continuing training, and now eight hours have been added to the monthly requirement, Toupal said.

Now, Binns said she expects people will be watching to see if “there’s a difference in how the dogs respond.”

Carter said abolishing the K-9 unit was never a consideration.

“I’ve seen our K-9 unit literally since I was a very young child,” said Carter, whose father is a retired St. Paul police officer. “My father used to take us out to the K-9 demonstrations and I’ve just seen what that unit is capable of, I’ve seen the way those officers serve our community with distinction and the goal has always been to ensure that that department and our entire department is able to provide the top quality service possible.”

K-9 BITE CASES COST CITY MORE THAN $2.6M

St. Paul K-9s accidentally bit people 12 times between 2012 and last July, and most of those dogs and handlers are no longer in the unit.

The one remaining K-9 nipped at a 10-year-old boy’s shirt, leaving him with a scratch on his stomach, when the child came up quickly behind the dog and reached his hand out in May 2018, according to a police report.

That dog’s handler remains in the unit, as does another officer whose dog was involved in two accidental bites in 2013; he now has a different K-9.

St. Paul paid out more than $2.6 million in six K-9 bite cases that happened between 2013 and last July.

The most costly was $2 million to Frank Baker, who fit a general description of a suspect but turned out not to be the suspect or involved in a crime. A K-9 held Baker’s leg for 70 seconds, while an officer kicked him in 2016.

Attorney Robert Bennett, who with Andrew Noel represented Baker and two other people who received settlements from St. Paul after K-9 bites, said he sees the policy changes as addressing serious concerns they found in their cases.

Desiree Collins, for example, was taking out her garbage when she was bit by a K-9 who was looking for a male burglary suspect in 2017. The handler’s announcement about the presence of the dog happened about seven minutes before the encounter and not in the area where Collins ended up being attacked, Noel has said. St. Paul settled Collins’ lawsuit for $520,000.

The new policy specifies that officers are to make loud announcements about the presence of a K-9 every time they move to an area where the previous warning may not have been heard.

“My civil rights clients want this to never happen again to anyone, and these policies appear to attempt to do that,” Bennett said.

K-9s NOW CERTIFIED IN TRACKING

With 16 K-9s and handlers, St. Paul has fewer dogs than past years. When Animal Planet featured the unit in the show “K9 Cops,” which premiered in 2008, there were 22 St. Paul police dogs.

The St. Paul police K-9 unit has consistently been recognized as national leaders. They won top department team in the U.S. Police Canine Association national competition in six of the past 10 years.

Finney’s report recommended prioritizing matching K-9s and handlers, and they’ve aimed to do that as the St. Paul Police K-9 Foundation donated five dogs to the unit in the past year, Toupal said. They look at how officers’ and dogs’ temperaments will pair up, along with how their sizes compare to each other, said Sgt. Mike Ernster, a St. Paul police spokesman who was previously a K-9 handler.

All except one of St. Paul’s K-9s and handlers are now certified in tracking, which they hadn’t been in the past. The dogs follow human scent, and clues like grass that has been trampled by someone running away, Ernster said.

The department allocated about $1,800 per handler to standardize K-9 equipment, according to Ernster.

K-9 HANDLERS HAPPY TO GET BACK TO WORK

Paul Kuntz, president of the St. Paul Police Federation, believes the K-9 policy needed to be tightened up, but he said any perception that the dogs were just “out attacking people was not the case.”

Patrol officers have mixed feelings about the new policies, including some with concerns about officer safety because of the restrictions on K-9 use, Kuntz said.

For example, if officers are called about an alarm that’s sounding and find a door ajar, but not direct evidence about whether a burglar is inside, they’ll have to search the building themselves, under the new policy.

“When there’s a large building, a dog would be able to search very, very quickly and now it’s going to fall on patrol officers to do that,” Kuntz said. “It’s very time consuming to do it right and do it safely so that nobody gets hurt.”

When the K-9s were not allowed to be used much over the last year, as the audit was being completed and the new policy written, the handlers would assist other officers on patrol, Toupal said.

Now, with the policy in place, Kuntz said handlers are “happy with the fact they get to go out and work their dogs and show, ‘We’re just here to protect people, we’re here to do our jobs.’ “

Police in Woodbury shot and injured a man late Sunday morning after the man called 911 saying he wanted police to kill him, officials say.

The shooting occurred about 11:30 a.m. in the 7000 block of Highpointe Road, according a news release issued by the Washington County sheriff’s office.

The man called 911 Sunday morning and said he was “having homicidal feelings” and that he “wants to die,” repeatedly telling dispatchers to “Come kill me,” the news release said.

Officers arrived less than 10 minutes later and found the man in the street. He “took a shooting stance directed toward officers,” the release said.

Police fired both lethal and non-lethal munitions at the man. He was taken to Regions Hospital where he was listed in stable condition.

The incident is under investigation by the BCA. No further details were available Sunday.