A 22-year-old man told police that he fired his gun intending to hit someone holding a knife and not the 59-year-old man who was killed on a St. Paul street in the middle of the night last week, according to charges.
Payton L. Wood, of St. Paul, was charged Thursday in Ramsey County District Court with two counts of second-degree murder in connection with the July 1 shooting of Jeffery C. Foss, of Moose Lake, Minn.
Wood remains jailed in lieu of $1 million bail ahead of an Aug. 1 court appearance. A message was left with his attorney seeking a response to the allegations.
According to the criminal complaint:
Medics called to the 600 block of N. Dale Street arrived shortly after 3 a.m. and found Foss on the ground. They declared him dead at the scene.
Exterior surveillance video showed Foss and another person walking on the sidewalk near the building where Wood lived. The other person started running while holding a knife.
Wood "came around the corner of the building and fired one shot from a handgun" that struck Foss, the charges read. Wood drove away from the scene.
Earlier that evening, according to a witness, Wood and the man who was with Foss had fought in a garden near Wood's apartment over a dispute involving ownership of bottles and cigarette packs on some picnic tables.
