A man was hospitalized after being struck in a hit and run crash in Forest Lake on Sept. 4. According to police, the man is currently believed to be in critical but stable condition.

Police were first notified of the hit and run around 11:15 p.m. Upon arriving in the 600 block of 4^th Street Southwest, officers located a man who was screaming in pain and saying he could not breathe. The man, Lloyd Phillip Angelo Thompson Jr., 24, of Forest Lake, had been in a wheelchair at the time of the crash. Police observed that the wheelchair had been broken into two pieces. There were several witnesses surrounding Thompson when police arrived.

Later, police located the suspect vehicle in the 1000 block of Apartment Lane in Forest Lake. After some questioning, they arrested Artevis Dewayen Glaze, 37, of Forest Lake, who they believed to be the alleged driver at the time of the hit and run. Glaze has not yet been charged. However, a records search reveals that he has previously been convicted for driving after his license was suspended, along with a variety of other crimes in Chisago, Washington and Ramsey counties.

A 27-year old Forest Lake man is being held on suspicion of second-degree murder in connection with a woman who was found dead Friday in an apartment in the 900 block of 12th Street Southwest in Forest Lake.

According to police, officers were called to the apartment around 8 p.m. on the report of a bad smell. Upon entering the apartment, they found a dead female, as well as Lauren Mason Grove Lynch, who was arrested. The woman’s name will be released pending official autopsy and identification processes.

Police believe there is no additional danger to the public and are investigating the death with the Washington County Sheriff’s Office and the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. More information will be posted as it becomes available.

Lauren Mason Grove Lynch, the 27-year-old man who was arrested Sept. 11 after officers found a woman’s decomposing body in his apartment, was charged today with second-degree murder. According to the criminal complaint, Lynch allegedly smothered and stabbed the woman, who was his roommate and girlfriend, three days before police arrived.

The complaint states that officers were called to the apartment at 957 12^th St. Southwest around 8 p.m. Sept. 11 after a man who lived at one of the other apartments in the building complained of a foul odor and worried that one of his neighbors had died. Upon attempting access to Apartment 206, where Lynch and the victim lived (her name has not yet been released), officers reportedly found the door barred by a chair. However, Lynch eventually allegedly let them inside, where they discovered the woman’s body lying on a couch and covered with a pillow and blankets.

When questioned on Sept. 13, Lynch allegedly told officers that he and his girlfriend had gotten into an argument on Sept. 8 that ended with him punching her and attempting to suffocate her with a pillow. He also said he stabbed her multiple times in the neck with a kitchen knife after trying to suffocate her. He had not left the apartment since killing the woman, he allegedly told police.

An autopsy over the weekend showed that the woman died of “homicidal violence,” with asphyxiation listed as the primary cause of death. Police are still waiting for final, official identification to be done before releasing her name to the public, though they believe they know the woman’s identity. Police reported that the woman’s decomposition was the source of the smell, as the original caller had feared.

Lynch has one DWI conviction and a couple of parking violations on his record in Minnesota, but no other serious crimes. More information on this case will be posted as it becomes available.

Motorists traveling on Highway 97 in Forest Lake will encounter a road closure and a detour on Friday, Sept. 18. Beginning at 10 p.m., construction crews will close Highway 97 between Forest Road and northbound Highway 61.

During the closure, the posted detour will direct eastbound Highway 97 motorists to take northbound Interstate 35 to eastbound Highway 8 to southbound Highway 61. Westbound Highway 97 motorists will be detoured to northbound Highway 61 westbound Highway 8 to southbound I-35.

The closure is needed so construction crews can do storm sewer work beneath the roadway. The road will reopen by 5 a.m. Monday, Sept. 21.

The work is part of a larger project to replace traffic signals at the north and south intersections of Highway 61 and Highway 97 and construct roundabouts. For more information about the project, visit mndot.gov/metro/projects/hwy61and97. All work is weather-dependent and may be rescheduled.

– Press release courtesy of the Minnesota Department of Transportation.

Law enforcement officers from the Forest Lake Police Department and the Washington County Sheriff’s Office responded to the scene of a crash on Hwy. 97 at Forest Rd. N. at 3:40 a.m. Sept. 16.
A 2000 Jeep Cherokee driven by Ronald A. Rucker, 52, of Forest Lake, was traveling westbound on Hwy. 97 at Forest Rd. N. A bicyclist, Alan Suazo, 26, of Forest Lake, was traveling eastbound on Hwy. 97. The bicyclist moved into the westbound lane headed eastbound and was struck by the Jeep Cherokee.

According to a Minnesota State Patrol report, Rucker suffered no apparent injuries. Suazo was killed as a result of this incident. The State Patrol report recorded that it is “unknown” whether Suazo was wearing a helmet or had alcohol in his system.

A 23-year-old Columbus man was charged Aug. 28 with domestic assault by strangulation and obstructing the legal process after he allegedly choked a woman and fled from sheriff’s deputies in Hugo.

According to court records, deputies responded to a home on Rosemary Way after a report of an assault in progress. When one officer arrived, she allegedly saw Clinton Ryan Nicholson outside the home, digging for something in his pocket. Nicolson reportedly fled after deputy directions to remove his hands from his pocket. Records state that he escaped into a nearby creek but was caught shortly thereafter by the same deputy who originally chased him, as she was patrolling the area on the lookout for him. Nicholson allegedly would not remove his hands from his pockets or get on the ground, so officers ultimately brought him to the ground. As they did, records state, he began kicking at them.

According to the victim, an acquaintance of Nicholson’s, the Columbus resident was taking some of his possessions from her home when he became angry at her, slapping her, head-butting her and grabbing her neck.

The complaint does not say what Nicholson had in his pockets.

Court reports

• The following are other recent court cases in Washington County related to the Forest Lake area:
• Jakob Richard Heir, 20, of Forest Lake, was charged Aug. 12 with fifth-degree drug possession.
• Tabitha Ann Hof, 42, of Forest Lake, was charged Aug. 12 with fifth-degree drug possession.
• Alicia Joellen Kampf, 43, of Forest Lake, was charged Aug. 13 with fifth-degree drug possession.
• Eddy Phantha, 27, of Brooklyn Park, was sentenced Aug. 14 for fifth-degree drug possession. He was charged in relation to a crime in Forest Lake.
• Kellie Kent Svoboda, 25, of Blaine, was charged Aug. 19 with theft in relation to an alleged crime in Forest Lake.
• Sharee Nicole O’Donnel, 28, of Forest Lake, was sentenced Aug. 19 for identity theft and failure to stop at an accident. She was charged in relation to a crime in Woodbury.
• Anthony Eugene Lascala, 32, of Forest Lake, was sentenced Aug. 20 for a fifth-degree drug crime.
• Brandon Lee Schumann, 21, of St. Paul, was sentenced Aug. 20 for a fifth-degree drug crime. He was charged in relation to a crime in Forest Lake.
• Kay Rachelle Dahlquist, 56, of Forest Lake, was charged Aug. 24 with fifth-degree drug possession.
• Brendon Michael Greiner, 26, of Blaine, was charged Aug. 27 for theft in relation to an alleged crime in Forest Lake.

A cement truck driver was airlifted to a hospital Friday evening after a rollover near the intersection of Everton Avenue and 11th Avenue in Forest Lake.

According to the Forest Lake Fire Department, the rollover occurred Friday around 7 p.m. The driver of the cement truck was the only person injured. The fire department extracted him from the truck before he was airlifted.

More information will be posted as soon as it’s available.

One of three men whose body was recovered when his boat capsized on Lake of the Woods has roots in and around Forest Lake.

Cody Joseph Ostendorf, 24, traveled onto Lake of the Woods in a small boat with Keith Ayers, 28, and Justin Kelly Haugtvedt, 22, late in the evening on Oct. 2. The next day, the men’s boat was found capsized, with life jackets underneath, and the men could not be found. Volunteers, the U.S. Border Patrol, the Lake of the Woods County Sheriff’s Office and others helped conduct searches for the men. On Oct .11, local authorities confirmed that Ostendorf’s body had been recovered from the water. Haugtvedt’s body was recovered two days prior.

Though initial reports listed all three men’s residence as Baudette, Ostendorf lived in Chisago City up until relatively recently, and unconfirmed reports from readers said that he and his family lived near Linwood Township when Ostendorf was younger. According to Ostendorf’s Facebook page, he graduated from Forest Lake Area High School in 2009.

A GoFundMe account raising money for the men’s families has been set up here.

More information on this story will be posted as it becomes available. If you have further information on Ostendorf’s local history, please contact The Times at 763-233-0714 or ryan.howard@ecm-inc.com.

A 63-year-old Columbus man died Oct. 11 after his motorcycle was involved in a crash near the intersection of Fawn Lake Drive Northeast and Thames Street Northeast in Linwood.

According to the Anoka County Sheriff’s Office, the crash occurred around 3:30 p.m. on Fawn Lake Drive, when an eastbound 1995 Chevrolet Monte Carlo driven by a 21-year-old Linwood woman collided with a westbound motorcycle driven by Wayne Donald Aszmann, 63, of Columbus. Aszmann was pronounced dead at the scene. At press time, the Linwood woman’s name had not been released.

The crash is under investigation by the Anoka County Sheriff’s Office, the Minnesota State Patrol and the Midwest Medical Examiner’s Office. Further details about the circumstances of or surrounding the accident have not yet been released.

If you are 55 or older, Minnesota law requires insurance companies to offer you a 10 percent reduction for three years if you complete the National Safety Council’s defensive driver course. For those who have taken the course and need to renew the discount, defensive driver refresher is the course you want to take. Both classes are offered by Forest Lake Area Schools Community Education and pre-registration is required as space is limited.

Defensive driving, held from 6 to 10 p.m. Oct. 20 and 22, is a two-session course taught by a professional and certified instructor. No driving or test is required, and you will receive a certificate of completion to provide to your insurance company. The defensive driving refresher, held from 6 to 10 p.m. Oct. 26 and Nov. 10 is a 4-hour one night class.

All class sessions are held in the media center at Century Junior High, 21395 Goodview, Forest Lake. Register online at flaschools.org/ce  or call 651-982-8110. For more information, contact Larry Damico, Program Coordinator at ldamico@flaschools.org or 651-982-8303.

Wyoming firefighters responded to a car fire that started on southbound Interstate Highway 35 around 7:30 a.m. Nov. 4. The car was about 1 mile south of Wyoming when the fire occurred. According to the Wyoming Fire Department, firefighters extinguished the car with no injuries, though the vehicle was a total loss. Currently, it is not known what started the fire.

On Halloween, Forest Lake police caught a St. Paul man wanted for a shooting in Edina.

Thomas Lee Gerlach, 22, of St. Paul, was recently charged in Dakota County Court with first-degree assault, aggravated robbery and illegal possession of a firearm. According to court records, Gerlach allegedly shot a man in the leg near the Edina Days Inn during a drug deal on Oct. 14.

On Oct. 31 around 4:15 p.m., Forest Lake police received a report of an unwanted male on Lilac Lane. Officers confirmed that the man was Gerlach, who had been wanted by authorities since his alleged crime, but witnesses reported that Gerlach had jumped a fence near the southbound Interstate 35 rest stop. Officers deployed Ranger, the department’s K-9 police dog, and the dog reportedly found Gerlach hiding in cattails in the I-35 ditch. Ranger latched onto Gerlach, who received non-life-threatening injuries from the dog.

“If it weren’t for the dog, we would have missed him,” Capt. Greg Weiss said.

A walker and a cyclist were both hurt after they collided on the 97 crossover bridge on the Hardwood Creek Trail in Forest Lake.

The collision occurred around 3:30 p.m. Nov. 15. Police received a 911 call that the two trail users had collided and arrived to find an injured Randy Gene Mitchell, 47, of Ham Lake, and a seriously injured pedestrian, Ellen Louise Reeves, 42, of North Branch, who had been walking with friends. Mitchell was treated at Fairview Lakes Medical Center, but Reeves was airlifted from the Forest Lake airport to North Memorial Medical Center in Robbinsdale. At press time, police had not received updates on her condition.

Car chase

Police also engaged in a brief car chase around 1:45 a.m. the same day. An officer attempted to make a turn signal violation stop near the intersection of Broadway and Fourth Street on a vehicle allegedly driven by Steven Lee Carter, 53, of Forest Lake, but the vehicle fled the scene.

Police pursued the vehicle with sirens on, and the car ultimately came to a stop on U.S. Highway 61 near the intersection with 210th Street North. Carter was allegedly found to be under the influence of alcohol, with a preliminary breath test showing a 0.21 blood alcohol content, and he was arrested for DWI.

A St. Paul man was charged Nov. 23 with promoting prostitution of an individual after law enforcement received a report that the man was scheduling stripping and sexual acts to be performed by a 17-year-old Forest Lake girl.

Damon Michael Dimartino, 40, of St. Paul, previously was convicted in 1999 and 2013 for criminal sexual conduct, the latter conviction of which he is still on probation for. According to the criminal complaint, Forest Lake police first learned of his alleged involvement with the Forest Lake girl on Oct. 14, when they responded to a domestic call between family members in the city and were told by the girl that she was supporting herself via prostitution.

The girl reportedly told officers that she was kicked out of her home in June 2015 and went to a club somewhere in the Twin Cities shortly thereafter. After the club closed, she said, she went to an after party met Dimartino, who she called “D.” The girl asked Dimartino if he would loan her some money, but he allegedly told her she had to work for it. She alleged that she began stripping on party buses before her behavior quickly escalated to performing a variety of sex acts on men for money. Dimartino allegedly arranged the stripping and sexual encounters, taking a cut of what the girl made (the complaint described the cut as a “$150 service fee”).

The girl also allegedly told officers that she would become anxious before appointments with johns (who she called “tricks” during a police interview), which led to Dimartino providing her with drugs and alcohol to calm her nerves. Though she admitted anxiety, the girl also believed that she was a comparatively successful prostitute, allegedly saying that she was “Number One” out of the six or seven females she believed were working as prostitutes for Dimartino.

Earlier that same day, the girl had allegedly been involved in two prostitution encounters in St. Paul arranged by Dimartino. In both cases, she said, she received $40 while Dimartino pocketed the rest (in the first instance, the girl said, Dimartino kept $210). Dimartino allegedly drove her from her residence to the encounters and back.

When asked by officers if she had ever been hurt while working as a prostitute, the girl reportedly said that she had been punched and slapped by various johns and added that she had felt threatened by Dimartino in previous situations, including once when she had threatened to stop working for him. The girl and Dimartino also allegedly had sex. Police read a text message they believe is an acknowledgment by Dimartino that the girl is a minor.

The girl allegedly had multiple text messages on her phone from Dimartino, some of which revealed him soliciting her for sex acts and stripping. He also allegedly asked her to get on birth control and to buy the morning after pill following a sexual encounter between the two of them.

According to police, none of the alleged prostitution incidents involving the girl and Dimartino are believed to have occurred in Washington County. The promoting prostitution charge is the only one leveled at Dimartino thus far, but the investigation is ongoing.

At the end of October, the department placed a sign that reads “Swap Spot” next to a space in the parking lot in front of the Forest Lake City Center. According to Detective Ashley LaValle, anyone who is buying or selling something via local commerce websites like Craigslist or social media sites like Facebook can use the spot as a designated pickup location if money or property will be exchanged in person.

“We’ve offered this spot to the public in the hopes to deter criminals from scamming, stealing or exchanging things like stolen property,” she said.

The spot is within view of city center security cameras and police headquarters, a fact which LaValle said will hopefully make potential criminals nervous about engaging in illegal activity.

In the past, she explained, local exchanges have often made in out-of-the-way spots or in the parking lots of large retail spaces, where criminals could not be easily identified or stopped. In insecure transactions with people contacted online, the buyer or seller could be victimized with theft or by receiving stolen property. In some rare cases (none in Forest Lake), people involved in such transactions have been subjected to violence.

“The hope is that the person purchasing the item would say, ‘Meet at the city center swap spot,’ and it would deter scammers (or other criminals),” LaValle said.

In addition to being a public area in view of security cameras, the swap spot may also be accompanied by a police presence, depending on the time of day and department workloads. If an exchange is set up during city center hours, one of the parties may walk into the building to request an officer be present during the exchange (during hours when the building is closed, police may be available on the department’s non-emergency line at 651-464-587). A police officer may not always be available, but LaValle said when an officer is available, he or she can observe the exchange to make sure no illegal activity takes place.

“That’s all based on the personnel available,” she noted.

The police also hope the site will be used by people who have less than amicable child custody situations. LaValle described the spot as a “neutral zone” where child exchanges can be made without fear of threatening or disturbing incidents on either side. She added that the space is available as a deterrent, not as a guarantee that nothing will go wrong.

“Even though it’s at the Police Department and the cameras are out there, we cannot guarantee that it’s always going to be safe,” she said.

So far, the department has gotten good local feedback on the swap spot designation, though LaValle wasn’t sure how often the space had been used. She hopes that it will gain more local use as word gets out about its existence.

In all personal exchange situations, at the swap spot or not, LaValle encouraged readers to take the right safety steps. Exchanges are best done during daylight, with a cellphone on hand in case one of the parties needs to call 911. The parties should not go to an exchange alone if possible, and if not possible, they should tell a friend or family member when and where they are going and what time they expect to be back. During an exchange, LaValle added, the parties should take note of the other person’s name, license plate and general description should a crime occur.

Editor’s note: There has been some reader confusion expressed about the different possibilities of money being moved from one part of the 2016 Forest Lake budget to another part. Previous to the council discussion of cutting $90,000 from the police budget to move to other parts of the budget, the council had also discussed cutting $10,000 for police transcription services and using that to help fund the American Legion’s Fourth of July celebration. No final decision has yet been made, but either of those actions could be accepted by the council independently from each other, or other decisions for how to allocate the funds could be made.

The issue wasn’t on the agenda, but the Forest Lake City Council’s pending decision on whether or not to cut a police officer from its 2016 budget was on a lot of people’s minds at the Nov. 23 council meeting.

The council will soon make its final decision on the proposal, which would move the $90,000 used to pay the officer and $10,000 in additional funding for police transcription services to other areas, including street improvements and helping the American Legion with the annual Fourth of July celebration. The body will discuss the plan again on Dec. 7, and, if it is unable to come to a decision that day, the proposal will be continued to Dec. 14. During the council’s Nov. 16 workshop, Mayor Stev Stegner and Councilmen Ben Winnick and Ed Eigner expressed support for the idea, while Councilmen Richard Weber and Michael Freer raised objections.

The Nov. 23 discussion of the plan began during the meeting’s open forum, when Fourth of July celebration head fundraisers Robin Kunkel and Krista Goodyear told the council they didn’t want their requests for direct financial support of the event by the city to cost the Police Department an officer position.

“If it comes down to that, we would like to withdraw our request for help with the fireworks,” Goodyear said.

The council could keep the officer while cutting the transcription services, which could allow the city to assist the Legion’s Fourth of July celebration, but no final decisions have been made.

The duo were followed by entreaties to keep the officer from residents Karen Morehead and Lynn Dufresne. Morehead said that the city has comparatively low taxes and that departments shouldn’t be cut at the expense of staff at current tax rates.

“While you continue to look (for savings, and) that’s admirable, I don’t think you can continue to look at employees,” she said.

Dufresne said Forest Lake will need an active, fully staffed police force as the city attracts more families and expansion.

“The city is growing, and I just think this isn’t the time to cut the Police Department,” she said.

Though he disagreed with Morehead’s levy remarks, saying that while city taxes might be comparatively low, they have been rising over the last few years, Freer concurred that he did not want to lose the officer this year (this summer, he suggested a study that would examine the costs and effectiveness of the current department compared to other policing solutions, rather than deciding to cut staff without more information). During the council remarks section of the meeting, he said he was against contributing city dollars to a paving project at the Forest Lake Daniel DePonti Airport, saying that the money the city could contribute next year should be rerouted to keep the officer. With a police job on the line, he said, “I don’t think (the paving project) is a prudent use of our resources.”

For his comments, Weber asked about his previous request that a full council be present to vote on the final 2016 levy and budget, as Freer will be absent from the Dec. 7 meeting. Stegner responded that he would be gone on Dec. 14, so either way, not all of the council members would be present.

During staff comments, Police Chief Rick Peterson told the council that if they had any last-minute questions on the police budget or operations, he would be at their service to address their queries.

“I know on Dec. 7 you have a pretty big decision to make,” he said.

Jonathan Young
Stillwater Gazette

Not long ago, Washington County Attorney Pete Orput didn’t think sex trafficking was an issue in Washington County.

“If you’d asked me six months ago, I’d have said, ‘Yeah, it’s a big problem, but not out here,’” Orput said.

That’s not his answer anymore.

Now he says the problem is more widespread than he ever guessed. That’s why his office is launching an initiative to combat sex trafficking in the county.

The initiative will include law enforcement partnerships, public education and a new prosecutor’s position that will focus on sex trafficking cases.

Assistant Washington County Attorney Imran Ali has been appointed as the “major crimes prosecutor,” a position approved by the County Board Oct. 13. Although he will prosecute other serious crimes, such as homicide, sophisticated insurance fraud and organized retail crime, he will focus on sex trafficking crimes as part of the new initiative.

“We started seeing more and more of those cases come up in Washington County, and we realized we have a problem — it’s not just confined to Minneapolis, St. Paul,” Ali said. “It’s not only a metro problem. It’s a statewide and nationwide problem as well. So what our office is going to be doing with the major crimes component is primarily focus on these sex trafficking cases.”

Ali said the rise of the Internet and social media have made sex trafficking less difficult than in the past and enabled it to travel more easily beyond urban centers.

Determining the precise extent of the problem is difficult. A September 2014 report to the state Legislature by the Minnesota Department of Public Safety notes, “Human trafficking, by its very nature, is a hidden crime whose victims often go unidentified, misidentified or undiscovered.” The report is conducted biennially, as required by state statute.

According to the 2014 report, a survey of service providers in the state found that at the time of the survey, respondents were serving five adult males, 79 adult females, 11 boys and 80 girls who were victims of sex trafficking. In 2013, service providers reported assisting 35 males, 202 adult females, 35 boys and 119 girls who were victims. The service providers reported working with victims subjected to crimes including forced prostitution, forced pornography and forced stripping.

According to the department of public safety report, in 2013 there were 472 human trafficking-related convictions in the state. The greatest number (347 convictions) fell into the category of “other prostitution charges,” followed by “solicitation, inducement and promotion of prostitution; sex trafficking” (63 convictions), and “solicitation of a child” (32 convictions).

However, the report notes: “These numbers … do not reflect the extent of trafficking and trafficking-related crime in Minnesota. Most of the individuals involved in human trafficking and related offenses are never arrested, charged or convicted; those who do interact with the legal system are often arrested, charged or convicted of different nontrafficking offenses.”

Washington County isn’t immune to the problem. The county attorney’s office isn’t the only agency to say so.

“Have we seen it? Have we been involved in investigations in the past? Absolutely,” Washington County Sheriff Bill Hutton said. “It is happening more, and our tools to investigate are getting better as well. … It crosses all boundaries and socio-economic classes.”

Recently, Stillwater police were involved in a high-profile case involving a junior high student and a suspect in Washington state who had contact with her over the Internet.
Stillwater Police Chief John Gannaway said such cases aren’t common in Stillwater, but it does happen, and it’s best to be proactive.

“It’s a serious crime,” he said. “It’s a stain on society, and it needs to be dealt with.”

The Forest Lake area also has been touched by alleged trafficking, after a St. Paul man was charged Nov. 23 for his alleged role in prostituting a 17-year-old Forest Lake girl.

“We’ll be working with law enforcement and making sure all of us are trained in this area,” Ali said.

The various agencies in the county will also pool resources when needed to investigate a case.

“There’s strength in numbers,” Hutton said. “When any agency has an issue, we can all come together.”

In addition to providing training for law enforcement, the initiative aims to foster cooperation among law enforcement and existing resources for victims.

“We can’t arrest our way out of this,” Hutton said. “We have to make sure we team up with the right people, and that means community services. … We are making the connections with all those resource groups, so as we are doing these investigations we can make sure that the victims are … at least provided with the opportunity to be given the resources that they need.”

The initiative also seeks to educate the community at large. Ali said community members need to know potential signs of sex trafficking and what to do if they suspect it’s happening near them or happening to a family member.

“We’ll be working on that in 2016,” Ali said.

But he added that if your gut tells you something’s wrong, contact law enforcement.

“One thing everybody can do is just be aware,” he said.

Orput said parents should also be aware of what their children are doing on the Internet.

“Parents, we need to be more involved in our teenagers’ lives,” he said. “Even when they resist it and don’t like it, it’s still part of our obligation.”

For the second time in as many budget cycles, the Forest Lake City Council voted to lay off an employee as it set its final budget for the coming year. This time, the council voted to remove $90,000 from the preliminary 2016 budget of the Forest Lake Police Department and spend it in other areas, leading to the layoff of patrol officer Max Boukal, who has worked for the city for more than two years.

The Dec. 7 vote, which keeps the city’s general fund budget and levy at their preliminary levels of $9.14 million and $8.96 million, respectively, was 3-1 in favor, with Mayor Stev Stegner and Councilmen Ben Winnick and Ed Eigner casting the deciding votes; city residential property taxes are expected to rise about 1.5 percent for the average Forest Lake taxpayer under the levy. Councilman Richard Weber voted against the move, and Councilman Michael Freer, who had voiced support throughout the budget process for keeping the officer level intact for 2016, had an engagement that kept him from attending.

The actual decision came during the city’s regular meeting, which started at 9:40 p.m. after a two-hour special budget meeting attended by at least 100 people – most of them city residents or members of the Police Department. During that time, a bevy of speakers voiced support for keeping the officer position and for Boukal’s job performance.

Many of those speakers were officers themselves, either those who worked for the city or those who make their home in the area.

Pat Ferguson, a longtime Forest Lake patrol officer in his early 50s, said that he felt guilt and uncertainty about Boukal’s future after he was offered a buyout and turned it down.

Patrol Sgt. Kurt Kowarsch’s voice broke as he described Boukal as the department’s most proactive officer and said, “You’re not going to find a better guy.”

St. Paul officer Brian Wanschura, who lives in Forest Lake, questioned the logic of cutting an officer in light of Stegner’s statement that crime rates in Forest Lake have fallen for the last six years.

“Because crime is going down, we should cut the very reason that crime is going down? That doesn’t make sense to me,” he said. “Just because you’ve never had a burglary doesn’t mean you stop locking your doors, right?”

One of the men speaking in favor of saving the job was Boukal himself, who said that he quickly fell in love with policing Forest Lake and wanted to spend his career in the city. With the specter of police layoffs raised in the fall of 2014, the summer of 2015 and the last two months, he added, the knowledge that he would be the officer losing a job has weighed heavily on him and his family. Though he wondered about the image such cuts projected to Forest Lake’s neighbors and the tone they set for the city’s public safety priority, Boukal returned to the personal effects of having his job repeatedly called into question.

“(During training,) one thing was reiterated over and over: Treat people the way you want to be treated,” he told the council. “I ask you, is this how you’d like to be treated?”

During public comment, a variety of issues popped up repeatedly. Residents asked the council for renewed police support with an eye on police protests around the country and the proliferation of mass shootings. They also questioned other potential budget decisions, like the council’s moving of $10,000 for police transcription services to help support the American Legion’s Fourth of July celebration and the upcoming discussion on whether or not to dedicate about $90,000 in the 2016 budget to assist in a paving project for the airport runway (that project was discussed on Dec. 8, after press time).

Though some residents suggested reallocating some of those funds to saving the officer position for a year, the council members insisted those decisions were separate from the officer discussion; for example, the council had been discussing the $10,000 transcription reallocation prior to the latest layoff proposal.

However, resident Brian Richert urged the council to look at all of those decisions holistically.

“It’s the same bucket of money,” he said. “All of our taxes go into this whole pool to pay for all of these things together. It doesn’t matter how you guys allocate them or how we allocate them; they’re not separate issues.”

Apologizing to the audience for any incoherence, explaining that he was fighting a 101-degree fever, Weber said that while he agreed with many aspects of the budget, he would be voting against it because of the officer layoff involved. He described the sacrifice of a person in uniform as a sacred honor and said that any cuts in police could come in a way less painful than laying off a dedicated employee.

“I would rather see it through attrition, through other methods, because (in) the military, (other methods) work quite well,” said Weber, an Air Force veteran. “Somehow, we always made it work, even when we thought we couldn’t.”

Though Freer, who announced his pending absence from the meeting several weeks earlier, had previously expressed his opinion that no officers should be cut in 2016, his and Weber’s views were not shared by Stegner, Eigner and Winnick. Though Stegner had been against cutting an officer during the city’s August budget talks, he explained that his desire to reallocate funds from the police department came during fall labor agreements, when he learned that Forest Lake police staff receive higher pay than many police staffs in comparable metro cities. He said wanted to moderate the city’s spending on the department, which at $4 million accounts for more than half of Forest Lake’s general fund spending.

“The folks who say that public safety is not important to the council, that really isn’t fair,” he said.

Though the $90,000 that would have covered Boukal’s wages and benefits will be moved to multiple areas of the budget, one of the major areas is funding for road seal coating. Winnick said that a move to lay off an officer was “terrible” but described it as a hard choice in the face of upcoming debt and large infrastructure projects that will need attention in the future, like road work and utility improvements.

“Bottom line is, looking to the future, not looking to the past, … there are needs everywhere in the city, and we’re trying to balance those,” he said. “We have limited options.”

Though Winnick said that he understood Police Chief Rick Peterson was operating on a very lean budget, Stegner and Eigner expressed disappointment that the chief was unable to point to other cuts besides an officer that could be made in the department budget when he was asked again this fall. Their remarks were occasionally met with jeers from the crowd, including when Stegner said that Peterson’s lack of options to cut “almost feels like it’s a power play.”

“I’m here; that’s how it feels,” he told the crowd after a chorus of groans subsided. “Don’t tell me how to feel.”

Eigner asked about Peterson’s assertion that the police had come in under budget each year since the chief got the job, wondering that, if extra money is always found at the end of the year, why it couldn’t be budgeted that way from the start. He threw out suggestions for other police cost cuts besides laying off an officer, like driving police cars for more miles before they’re replaced or reducing the police budget by the amount Peterson usually finds in savings at year’s end.

“Do you really believe that there’s no money to be saved in that budget, that there’s no fat whatsoever in that budget?” he asked the audience, who greeted him with several responses of “yes.” “Well, I don’t.”

City Administrator Aaron Parrish told the council that he believed looking for additional non-staff cuts in the police budget would be a losing battle, instead framing the layoff as a question of where the council wants to focus.

“If you want to save the position, you’ve got to reprioritize your reprioritization that you talked about earlier,” he said.

Though Stegner said that the layoff, which takes effect at the end of the year, would not affect the number of officers on the street, Police Captain Greg Weiss told The Times after the meeting that that won’t always be true.

Currently, the department uses Nicholas Kent, the city’s K-9 officer, as an additional “power car,” assigning him on swing shifts to aid fellow officers on weekends and during other high-volume call times, as well as to cover for officers who are using vacation time. With Boukal gone, Kent will be slotted into the regular shift rotation, leaving him unavailable to be an additional officer on the streets during high-volume call periods and removing his ability to cover for officers on vacation, which Weiss said will lead to more overtime shifts for other officers. During the public comment portion of the meeting, two Washington County dispatchers told the council that it’s not uncommon for Forest Lake police to get so many calls that the on-duty officers (sometimes only two, even on a weekend) are unable to respond in a timely manner, leading Washington County deputies to fill in on busy nights.

Expressing regret for what they said was a necessary move, Stegner, Eigner and Winnick ultimately voted in favor of the final budget and layoff, with Stegner and Winnick stating that they believed the cut to police staff would not be repeated in future budget cycles.

“It’s no easier for us to make those decisions, and I don’t want – I don’t think we’ll have to look at it again,” Winnick said.

The crowd grumbled in dissent following the vote, but they’d already said their piece. Before the decision, some residents promised retribution at the ballot box should Forest Lake’s officers drop from 26 to 25.

“I voted for each and every one of you that’s up there, and I guarantee you that you would not have my vote had you said this was your plan when you got up in that chair,” resident Alex Gutierrez said.

A St. Paul man charged with raping a 17-year-old girl was arrested by Forest Lake police and a U.S. Marshal’s fugitive task force on Dec. 7 around 4:30 p.m. According to Forest Lake police, the man was arrested on the grounds of the Belair Company, located on North Lake Boulevard.

The suspect is Jesus Medina, 42, of St. Paul, who was charged in July with first-degree sexual assault and kidnapping. According to court records, Medina was one of two men who snatched a 17-year-old off the street as she was walking in St. Paul in February. The girl told law enforcement that the duo took her to a house in the city, where Medina allegedly beat her and raped her. Shown a photo lineup, the girl reportedly was able to pick Medina out as her rapist and realized that he used to rent a room in her family’s residence.

The U.S. Marshal’s office was the lead investigative team on the case, assisted in the arrest by Forest Lake police. Police Captain Greg Weiss said investigation yielded information that Medina was living and working in the city.