Almost three years to the day since a man burglarized a St. Paul apartment, prosecutors say, he was ransacking another one — this time with deadly results.
Prosecutors charged Albert George McIntosh, 30, on Monday with second-degree murder in the Oct. 18 shooting of Sarah Wierstad. He is the third man charged in her death.
The men selected Wierstad’s Railroad Island apartment, in the area of Beaumont and Bedford streets, to burglarize at random and she returned from work while they were inside, according to charges.
Wierstad followed the burglars outside, asked for her phone back and told them her 5-year-old daughter was on her way home, the criminal complaints said. That’s when prosecutors say McIntosh shot Wierstad. The 24-year-old died after a bullet went through her heart.
The allegation of “a random criminal act of violence leading to the murder of the victim … is just incredibly sad and tragic and scary in many ways,” Ramsey County Attorney John Choi said Monday.
Wierstad’s homicide was the third in a five-day span on St. Paul’s East Side, and the cases led residents to pack police community meetings last week to voice their concerns. Prosecutors have now charged five people in two of the homicides.
St. Paul police built the Wierstad case with fingerprint evidence, surveillance footage and information from people they arrested, the complaints show. Homicide and gang unit investigators, along with officers from other units, have put in long hours and worked tenaciously, a police spokesman said.
Prosecutors had charged Alvin Rudolph Bell, 24, with second-degree intentional murder in the Wierstad case on Thursday; after charging McIntosh, they amended the charge to aiding and abetting second-degree unintentional murder while committing a felony. On Friday, prosecutors charged Isiah Lee Harper, 26, with first-degree aggravated robbery and first-degree burglary in the case.
After police arrested McIntosh, of Minneapolis on Friday, he “denied knowing anything about the murder” and initially said he did not know the others arrested, according to the criminal complaint.
Wierstad’s family buried her Friday and went to court Monday as McIntosh and Harper made their first appearances. Bail was set at $1 million for McIntosh and at $500,000 for Harper.
“They need to see us in court and to know there’s a face behind the person they took the life of,” said Christine Smith, Wierstad’s aunt. “This was an innocent life they took and they have to be accountable for that. Our system needs to change, it really does.”
On Oct. 18, Wierstad was returning from working a double shift cooking at Alton Memory Care in St. Paul’s Highland Park neighborhood. She worked hard to support herself and her daughter and was attending culinary school with the hope it would lead to a better job, her family has said.
McIntosh has four prior felony convictions — two motor vehicle thefts, an attempted first-degree burglary involving use of a firearm and second-degree burglary, court records show. He got out of prison in December after he served about two years for a St. Paul burglary conviction. He was on supervised release, which was slated to end in November when his burglary sentence expires. Inmates in Minnesota prisons generally serve two-thirds of their sentences behind bars and the rest on supervised release in the community.
“How many slaps on the wrists do these guys receive before they receive serious time?” asked Mark Nedoroski, who owns the apartment building McIntosh burglarized in 2012. “I understand that’s a tough question because those are property crimes, but … it seems like it starts with lower-level stuff and escalates to murder.”
Amy Forstner encountered McIntosh after the 2012 burglary and said Monday that she is grateful nothing happened to her.
On Oct. 17, 2012, Nedoroski heard from a resident about someone trying to get into an apartment building on Randolph Avenue, a few blocks from Snelling Avenue. He made two calls — to 911 and to Forstner, his partner in Well Maintained Apartments.
Forstner went to the building. “In hindsight, had I thought anyone would still be there, I would have been much more hesitant to go,” she said.
As she walked down a hallway, she heard a noise coming from upstairs. “My gut reaction was, ‘I don’t think I should be here,’ ” Forstner said.
She backtracked and then saw two men coming down the stairs; they also saw her, she said. “I thought, ‘Where are the police?’ turned around and saw a St. Paul police officer on the back steps,” Forstner said; she let the officer in.
“I feel lucky that nothing did happen to me … but now this poor girl has been killed,” Forstner said. “It’s very sad.”
On Oct. 18 this year, Harper told police that he, Bell and a man he knew as “AB” had entered a home, looking for items to steal and that he acted as lookout. As Bell handed Harper stolen items, Harper said, he heard a noise from the back door and lights came on.
Wierstad appeared, and one of the men ordered her to get on the ground. Bell stole Wierstad’s purse and the men left, the complaint said.
When they got to the vehicle, Harper said, he heard AB saying to Wierstad, “Stay back. Stop following us,” the complaint said. Harper said he saw AB go back and then heard four to five shots. AB ran and got into the vehicle.
Police who responded to the shooting found a window screen at Wierstad’s nearby residence had been cut, and they traced fingerprints from the window to Bell, the complaint said. Wierstad’s credit card was used at a Minneapolis gas station less than 30 minutes after the shooting, and Bell was seen in surveillance video at the station, according to the complaint.
Later, after police arrested Harper, they showed him a photo array and he identified McIntosh as AB, the complaint said. A woman who was arrested but not charged in the case confirmed McIntosh’s street name is AB. McIntosh told police “his presence at the Holiday gas station was coincidence,” the complaint said.
Mara H. Gottfried can be reached at 651-228-5262. Follow her at twitter.com/MaraGottfried.
HOW TO HELP
Donations for Sarah Wierstad’s daughter are being accepted by an account in her maternal grandmother’s name. They can be directed to the Julie Zietlow Memorial Fund 002, NSP Credit Union, 825 Rice St., St. Paul, MN 55117. A fund has also been set up at http://bit.ly/1LSM1BF.
