Murder charge: Man said he shot ex-wife to thwart her future with new husband

A man accused of fatally shooting his ex-wife in the Robbinsdale home they once shared said he killed her because he didn't want her new husband to assume his place in her life, according to charges filed Tuesday.

Robert D. McCloud, 64, of Brooklyn Center, was charged in Hennepin County District Court with second-degree intentional murder in connection with the shooting Friday morning of Lauri Deatherage in her home in the 3400 block of N. Grimes Avenue. McCloud remains jailed ahead of a court appearance Wednesday afternoon. Court records do not list an attorney for him.

Four days before she was shot, Deatherage was celebrating her new marriage to a fellow Air Force veteran with whom she reunited after decades apart.

Billy Deatherage, 53, told the Star Tribune on Sunday that the two of them met 30 years ago while stationed at the Air Force base in Grand Forks. They reconnected as friends about four years ago. He proposed this spring, and they married on June 13, the same day as her 48th birthday.

"Our time was cut short by an atrocious act," he said. "We had been married less than one week before she was taken away from me."

McCloud mailed flash drives to family members before shooting the woman who divorced him three years ago, the criminal complaint read. Officers viewed video from one of the flash drives that showed McCloud saying he intended to kill himself and knew it was wrong to involve his ex-wife in his plot, the complaint continued.

However, he explained, she had just remarried and he wasn't going to let "that hillbilly" get all his stuff and his wife, the charging document quoted McCloud as saying.

Lauri Deatherage, formerly known as Lauri McCloud, planned to move to Arkansas to be with her new husband after closing on the sale of her home.

According to the criminal complaint:

Police acting on a request for a welfare check located Lauri Deatherage's body on the floor of the master bedroom. She had been shot once in the head.

Someone described as a "reporting party" told police that McCloud had recently bought a gun and admitted going to his ex-wife's house.

McCloud said that he stood over her while she was on the bed and shot her as she reached for the phone. He said he believed she was going to call 911.

Police went to McCloud's home in the 6200 block of Unity Avenue understanding he intended to shoot himself.

Officers began negotiations with McCloud, who said at one point during the 10-hour standoff that "they caught themselves a murderer and saved a suicide [and the] plan was to take care of business with [his ex-wife] then myself, but I took care of business with her, and I left.' "

McCloud surrendered before he could harm himself. Authorities found a loaded pistol in the home. Also seized were ammunition, a key to Lauri Deatherage's home and clothing that appeared to have been bloodied.

Staff writer Kim Hyatt contributed to this report.

Paul Walsh • 612-673-4482