Boyfriend charged with homicide in Eagan woman's death

An Eagan 19-year-old was stabbed more than 100 times by her estranged boyfriend before she was left to die of her wounds and exposure along a rural Steele County road, according to court documents filed Monday.

Ryan S. Hurd, 21, of Tulsa, Okla., confessed to stabbing Kathryn Rose Anderson, 19, after a domestic dispute escalated, according to second-degree murder charges filed in Steele County District Court.

Friends and family members had worried about the safety of Anderson, a Morris, Minn., native who was studying to become a pastry chef.

Hurd had allegedly assaulted her on Oct. 29 and was involved in another domestic disturbance earlier in October, so Anderson had obtained a no-contact order against him in Dakota County District Court. That order prohibited him from having any contact with her, court documents say.

A passerby found Anderson's body just before 8 a.m. Thursday on a gravel road about 5 miles outside of Owatonna.

The evening before, Anderson had spoken on the phone with her close friend, Amber Azpiroz-Blas. During that conversation about 8 p.m., Azpiroz-Blas told investigators, she learned about the conflict between the couple.

Azpiroz-Blas tried for hours after that to reach Anderson, but phone calls would roll into Anderson's voice mail, and there were no responses to the text messages. Later, when Azpiroz-Blas finally reached Hurd by phone, he told her that the two had fought and that Anderson left the Eagan apartment about 3 a.m. on Thursday, the charging documents say.

"Ryan Hurd indicated that was the last time he saw her and indicated something to the effect that 'she said she was seeing someone else' and he was leaving," the complaint quotes Azpiroz-Blas as reporting to police. "Ryan said their relationship was over, and he was going back to Tulsa."

Hurd was arrested by police Friday in Tulsa, his hometown. He told investigators that he had driven Anderson south from Eagan, argued with her, and then stabbed her multiple times before leaving her where he had stabbed her, the documents say.

He then drove her car back to Minneapolis, where he bought a bus ticket to Tulsa, he told police.

Authorities surmise that Hurd and Anderson left southbound Interstate 35 and headed east on Hwy. 14 to County Road 17. On Thursday, the passerby spotted the body amid blood stains that were spread out for some distance on the gravel road. Authorities began trying to identify the body, with pink fingernail polish, a hooded sweatshirt and boxer shorts.

That night, the victim's father, Gary Anderson, phoned Steele County authorities after learning that the body of a young woman had been found near Owatonna. He told them that he believed it might be his daughter.

An autopsy at Regina Medical Center in Hastings on Friday found 109 stab wounds as well as deep abrasions on Anderson's lower body, which were consistent with a body hitting the asphalt and sliding along the gravel surface, the charging documents say.

Anderson was a 2008 graduate of Morris Area High School. She had been studying to become a chef at Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Mendota Heights. She was known for her love of fishing, hunting and wintry weather.

Hurd waived extradition and will be taken to the Steele County jail within a few days, prosecutors said.

Court records show that in October, he had been sued for more child-support money by a 19-year-old Morris woman with whom he'd had a child.

Joy Powell • 952-882-9017