Authorities say man killed at Minn. rest stop was shot in head

Two Washington state men have been identified as a Maple Grove rest stop homicide victim and the suspected shooter.

On Thursday, the Ramsey County medical examiner confirmed that Johnathon Dean Mar, 18, of Kennewick, Wash., died of blood loss due to multiple gunshot wounds after police shot him Wednesday on I-694 following an 18-mile chase across three counties in the Twin Cities.

He led police on the high-speed chase from Maple Grove to Shoreview after police say Mar fatally shot Matthew Paul Maffei, 23, in the head at a rest stop.

The Hennepin County medical examiner identified Maffei on Thursday, listing his address as unknown, but records show he has lived in both Ephrata and Kennewick, Wash.

The state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) is still investigating the officer-involved shooting, and Maple Grove police are investigating the homicide. Why the two men were in Minnesota and what led to the shooting before the police pursuit remains unclear.

According to records, Maffei has an extensive record back to 2006 of theft, burglary and assaults.

Mar was a senior in Kennewick School District, 30 miles from the Oregon border, attending Legacy High School and Tri-Tech Skills Center, according to the school district. The school district said Mar bounced around to three schools in the 17,000-student district between 2011 and 2014, only attending a total of seven months before and after attending an online school.

He had no previous criminal record with local police, Kennewick police said.

High-speed chase

About 1 a.m. Wednesday, Hennepin County received a call about a shooting at the Elm Creek Rest Area on I-94 in Maple Grove. Police arrived and found Maffei, who died at the scene from a gunshot to the head. A witness gave police a description of a vehicle leaving the rest area near Weaver Lake Road and a short time later, police spotted a red SUV with Oregon license plates in the area of I-694 and I-94.

Officers chased the vehicle for miles as it sped east on I-694, reaching 115 miles per hour. Near Rice Street in Shoreview, Mar, who was alone in the car, crashed into cable barriers in the center median, according to scanner reports. With officers from several jurisdictions converging on the scene, he got out of the vehicle and "brandished a weapon" at officers before they shot him, the sheriff's office said.

Authorities didn't specify what type of weapon he had. Afterward, the crime scene investigation shut down I-694 between I-35W and I-35E for more than eight hours, tangling the morning rush hour for thousands of commuters.

Investigation continues

The shooting of Mar involved a Brooklyn Center police officer and Hennepin County sheriff's deputy, both of whom will be identified Friday.

So far this year, there have been 18 officer-involved shootings in Minnesota that have been reported to the BCA, including a high-speed police chase during the morning rush hour Feb. 7 that ended in the fatal shooting of a couple on Hwy. 212 in Eden Prairie. In 2013, 22 officer-involved shootings resulted in eight deaths in Minnesota and in 2012, 27 officer-involved shootings statewide left eight dead.

Kelly Smith • 612-673-4141

Twitter: @kellystrib