Edina police say missing woman is dead and fugitive ex-boyfriend is suspect

An Edina woman who went missing two weeks ago is dead, according to police, and they allege that her former boyfriend killed her.

An Edina police report states that 25-year-old Joseph S.A. Porter is "responsible for the death" of Cristina Prodan, 27, according to a warrant filed in Hennepin County that seeks his return to Minnesota for violating a court order that barred him from contacting Prodan.

On Thursday, police spokeswoman Kaylin Eidsness said the case has now been turned over to the U.S. attorney's office.

Porter, 25, is jailed in Little Rock, Ark., charged with a felony theft that occurred several days after Prodan was last seen on Jan. 5. Prodan has yet be located.

State police stopped Porter about 4 a.m. on Jan. 10 in Jacksonville, Ark. He was in a car that had been stolen in New Orleans, and his jail mug shot shows fresh injuries to his face that appear to be burns. He was charged Monday with theft ranging from $5,000 to $25,000 and appeared in court Wednesday. Bail was set at $500,000. Authorities have not talked publicly about Prodan's whereabouts.

In December, Porter was sentenced in Hennepin County District Court for violating a domestic abuse no-contact order after police caught him inside Prodan's apartment. She said she let him in because he had been sleeping outside in a recreational vehicle, according to police.

At his sentencing Dec. 28, Judge Jacqueline Regis put Porter on two years' probation, and ordered him to undergo anger management treatment and abide by the no-contact order.

In an interview Wednesday with the Star Tribune, Porter's mother said police came to her door in rural Arkansas and told her that Prodan was dead.

"I knew it from the beginning. My worst fears have come true," Arlie Kathryne said. She said her son has been in trouble with the law throughout his life.

"He warned me he was going to kidnap her, and empty her bank account and her safety deposit box."

She said Edina police and the FBI have told her very little about Prodan's disappearance. She did say law enforcement told her they "found a shovel in the back seat of his car when he was pulled over."

Livia Prodan, Cristina's mother, told two Twin Cities television stations in recent days that her daughter and Porter met through Facebook and he moved from Arkansas to her apartment in the fall.

"She lost her baby," said Kathryne. "That was my granddaughter."

Kathryne also had a no-contact order taken out on her son, in 2014.

As for her relationship with her son and Prodan, Kathryne said, "I don't like my son … Cristina called me Mom, [but] the more I cared for her and expressed that to him, the more he made her life hell."

Porter's mother said Prodan sent her a text on Jan. 4, the day before she disappeared that said, "she would always love me, no matter what. She said my son was angrier than ever, and it was scaring her, and she wanted to know what to do. I didn't know what to tell her."

Paul Walsh • 612-673-4482