A 16-year-old boy has been charged with being an accomplice in the shooting death last month in St. Paul, the underlying case behind a predawn police raid in downtown Minneapolis that killed Amir Locke three weeks ago.
2nd teen charged in homicide that prompted police raid that killed Amir Locke
Charges say the 16-year-old was at the scene in St. Paul, where Locke's teenage cousin shot Otis Elder.
February 23, 2022 at 2:30PM
Feysal J. Ali, of Minneapolis, was charged Tuesday in a juvenile petition filed in Ramsey County with two counts of aiding and abetting second-degree murder in the death of Otis R. Elder, 38, as the man sat in his vehicle.
County prosecutors said they intend to have Ali certified to be prosecuted as an adult. Authorities issued a warrant for Ali's arrest.
Charged earlier with being the shooter was 17-year-old Mekhi Speed, who was living in a different unit of the Bolero Flats Apartment Homes at 1117 S. Marquette Av. but had access to the unit where police barged in Feb. 2 and shot the 22-year-old Locke, who emerged from under a blanket with gun in his hand. Speed and Locke are cousins.
Investigators allege that Ali's cellphone was at the scene of the shooting and near the apartment building where Locke was shot, according to the charges.
The charges also say that police found Ali's fingerprints on a stolen vehicle that he and Speed used to flee to downtown Minneapolis after the shooting.
Also, his DNA was recovered from a jacket that investigators say was being worn by someone sitting next to Elder when he was shot, the charges added.
His DNA was found to match a sample on file in a "convicted offender database," the charges continued.
According to Ramsey County prosecutors:
On the night of Jan. 10, officers answered a 911 call in St. Paul's Hamline-Midway neighborhood and found Elder in the street wounded in the back outside a music recording studio in the 500 block of N. Prior Avenue. The Minneapolis man died about 30 minutes later at Regions Hospital.
A person speaking with Elder on the phone just before he was shot told police that "it sounded like Elder was conducting a drug transaction [and] the phone call then abruptly ended," according to the charges.
As their investigation progressed, St. Paul police filed applications for search warrant affidavits for three Bolero Flats apartments.
Locke, who was not a target of the investigation, was sleeping in the apartment of relatives when a Minneapolis police SWAT team burst in shortly before 7 a.m. Feb. 2.
Video from an officer's body camera showed police rushing inside and yelling "Search warrant!" as Locke lay under a blanket on the couch. An officer kicked the couch, Locke stirred, holding a firearm in his right hand. He was shot by officer Mark Hanneman, the fatal moment happening within seconds.
The state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension is investigating Locke's death and will turn over its findings to a prosecution team led by state Attorney General Keith Ellison for consideration of charges against the officer.
Police began looking for Speed on Jan. 24 and found him about two weeks later in Winona.
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