11 years after Minneapolis homicide charge dropped, new count filed

Last update: February 20, 2009 - 8:39 PM

A Minnesota prison inmate was charged Friday in a 1998 Minneapolis homicide.

Jaymichael Hargrove was charged in October of that year in the shooting death of an 18-year-old Minneapolis man who Hargrove claimed beat up his foster brother. The charges were later dismissed because of witness issues, but Hargrove landed in prison in 2004 for committing a sex crime.

The homicide case remained cold until last October, when a witness told police that Hargrove had confessed to the killing. On Friday, he was again charged with second-degree murder.

Hargrove, 28, is currently in the Rush City correctional facility.

According to the criminal complaint filed in Hennepin County District Court:

Julius Gaston and his girlfriend, Pauline Wilson, were shot about 8 p.m. Oct. 19 standing on a duplex porch in the 3100 block of Chicago Avenue S. in Minneapolis. Gaston died the next day; Wilson needed emergency surgery to repair her small intestine, liver and kidney.

Several witnesses were also standing on the porch during the shooting, and one of them identified Hargrove as the shooter. He was allegedly at the duplex to "back up" another man who had a previous altercation with Gaston.

The complaint doesn't explain why the initial charge against Hargrove was dismissed. The county attorney's office said only that the charges were dismissed and that they had the right to file new charges against Hargrove.

DAVID CHANEN

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