Man admits bombing Minneapolis hair salon, returning year later and vandalizing the shop

A 59-year-old man has admitted that he set off a bomb at a Minneapolis hair salon in 2022 and returned a year later to lob a brick through the store’s window.

Michael Allen Francisco pleaded guilty Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis to using an explosive to “maliciously damage or destroy” a business following a lengthy federal investigation that included forensic analysis and an eventual admission during a search of the man’s home in March.

The plea agreement calls for Francisco to serve the mandatory minimum of at least five years in prison followed by anywhere from one to three years of supervised release. Francisco also agreed that he is obligated to pay more than $170,000 in restitution. He is scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 5.

According to a sworn affidavit from a special agent assigned to the FBI’s joint terrorism task force, video images from a Ring device showed Francisco placing an explosive on the window of the Studio 411 Salon, at 411 S. Cedar Lake Road, and fleeing in a vehicle before it detonated about 2:50 a.m. on Nov. 20, 2022.

Francisco was also identified in video images throwing a landscaping brick through a window at the salon around 1:25 a.m. on Nov. 6, 2023.

In late March, the FBI and Minneapolis police searched Francisco’s home and seized a black jacket suspected to have been worn by Francisco during the brick-throwing incident. Agents also found multiple explosive components, including suspected “energetic powders and fuses,” a .32-caliber revolver with ammunition and suspected methamphetamine.

Francisco has a prior bank robbery conviction from 2001 for which he was sentenced to 12½ years in federal prison, making him ineligible to possess a firearm.

In interviews with law enforcement during the search, Francisco confessed both verbally and in writing to lighting the fuse on the explosive device that damaged Studio 411 and throwing the brick at the salon’s window a year later.

Publicly available court records do not reveal why Francisco targeted the salon in Minneapolis’ Bryn Mawr neighborhood.

The FBI reviewed police records and found that Francisco was linked to another case of possessing an explosive device: In March 2023, Minneapolis police found Francisco trespassing near an abandoned lumber yard in northeast Minneapolis. He left the area on foot, but officers noticed an unoccupied pickup truck nearby with its engine running and doors unlocked.

Before towing the truck, police found an explosive device inside the center console that the department’s bomb squad recovered.

Star Tribune staff writer Stephen Montemayor contributed to this report.