Dunn County proceeding with case against Minn. man accused of hiding 4 corpses
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DARREN OSBORNE
(MCWRIGHT)
By LeAnn R. Ralph
MENOMONIE — Dunn County is moving forward with the case against a Minnesota man accused of being a party to the crime of hiding four corpses in northern Dunn County.
Darren L. Osborne, who also is known by 11 other aliases, appeared in Dunn County Circuit Court before Judge James Peterson May 31.
Osborne, age 59, made an initial appearance in Dunn County Circuit Court April 30 after appearing in court March 7 by video from the Minnesota Correctional Facility at Faribault for a hearing concerning a return on a warrant.
During the March 7 hearing, Osborne told the court he had been told in Minnesota that if he took a plea deal, he would not be charged in Wisconsin, according to on-line court records.
Osborne is charged in connection with a quadruple homicide that occurred in Minnesota in September of 2021.
The bodies of the four people who were murdered were left in a vehicle in a corn field in the Town of Sheridan after being shot to death by Antoine D. Suggs, who is Osborne’s son.
Suggs drove the vehicle containing the four bodies, and Osborne accompanied him in another vehicle so Suggs would have a ride back to Minnesota after abandoning the vehicle with the bodies in a corn field.
Suggs and Osborne stopped at the Bridge Stop in Wheeler before proceeding north on state Highway 25.
Suggs was convicted by a Ramsey County, Minnesota, jury on four counts of second degree murder (with intent, not premeditated) in March of 2023, and was sentenced in May of 2023 to 103 years in prison.
The victims were Nitosha Lee Flug-Presley (age 30) (found in the front passenger seat of the SUV); Jasmine Christine Sturm (age 31) (rear passenger side); Loyace Foreman III (age 35) (center rear seat); Matthew Isiah Pettus (age 26) (rear driver’s side seat).
No deal
During the March 7 hearing, Judge Peterson told Osborne that no one in Minnesota is able to speak for Wisconsin and to make a plea deal in which someone would not be charged for another crime in another state.
During a preliminary hearing in Dunn County Circuit Court April 30, Osborne was represented by attorney Travis Satorius, according to on-line court records.
Judge Peterson found there was probable cause at the preliminary hearing and bound Osborne over for trial.
During a court hearing May 10, Judge Peterson said he had received a fax message from Osborne stating that Osborne wanted to fire his attorney.
Osborne told the judge during the hearing that he wanted a change of venue because he did not believe he would get a fair trial.
Judge Peterson said court personnel had investigated Osborne’s claim of a deal in Minnesota, and that a transcript from Minnesota shows there was no such deal.
The judge denied Osborne’s request for a change of venue and said there was no basis for a change in venue.
Osborne stated again that he wanted to fire his attorney and asked if the public defenders’ office would appoint another attorney for him.
Judge Peterson relieved Satorius of his responsibility to represent Osborne.
Public defender
At a hearing May 24, Judge Peterson told Osborne that he had received information from the public defenders’ office and that the office had not yet found an attorney to represent Osborne.
At a hearing May 31, Judge Peterson told Osborne he had contacted the state Public Defenders’ Office, and that they still had not yet found an attorney to represent Osborne, partially due to the fact that the case had been set for a jury trial later in June.
Osborne told the court he would prefer to delay the jury trial so that he would have an attorney to represent him, and once again, Osborne requested a change of venue.
And once again, Judge Peterson said he had not seen anything that would require a change of venue.
Dunn County District Attorney Andrea Nodolf told the court she already had a number of witnesses subpoenaed for the trial, but the judge said there were valid reasons for removing the trial from the court calendar and rescheduling it.
Nodolf also asked for a high cash bond, and Judge Peterson set bail for Osborne at $50,000 cash.
Another court hearing is scheduled for June 10.
Corn field
According to the criminal complaint, the Dunn County Sheriff’s Department received a report on Sunday, September 12, 2021, at about 2:18 p.m. of multiple people who were not moving in a vehicle. The vehicle was located in a corn field on County Road VVV in the Town of Sheridan.
Law enforcement officers responded and located the vehicle, which was identified as a 2008 black Mercedes Benz with Minnesota registration.
Officers observed four people in the vehicle, all of whom appeared to be deceased.
The vehicle was registered to Luxury Auto Sales LLC, and when officers contacted the 55 year old woman listed as the registered owner of the vehicle, the woman said the co-owner of Luxury Auto Sales, a 35-year-old woman, was in possession of the vehicle and had planned to drive it to Georgia.
The 35-year-old woman told law enforcement officers she had given the vehicle to Antoine D. Suggs, according to the criminal complaint.
Wheeler gas station
After receiving a tip from an individual who had seen two vehicles driven by black men near the Sheridan Town Hall between 10:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. Sunday, a Dunn County deputy went to the Bridge Stop gas station in Wheeler to review video surveillance from shortly after noon on Sunday, September 12, according to the complaint.
A black Nissan Rouge can be seen pulling up to the gas pump at the Bridge Stop at about 12:07 p.m.
The driver of the Nissan, an adult black male, wearing an “I am black history” shirt, goes into the store to purchase some items and then exits the store.
A black Mercedes pulled into the parking lot next to the Nissan Rouge.
The last three numbers on the registration plate of the Mercedes were “325” and were consistent with the vehicle in which the four victims had been found, the complaint states.
The driver of the Nissan made contact with the driver of the Mercedes and appeared to exchange something. The Mercedes can then be seen traveling north on state Highway 25, followed by the Nissan.
The deputy searched the spot were the Mercedes, as seen on the surveillance video, was parked at the gas station and saw reddish, dark-colored droplets of an unknown substance that was suspected to be blood.
The license plate of the Nissan Rouge can be seen on the surveillance video, and the vehicle was registered in Minnesota.
MN complaint
According to the statement of probable cause from Ramsey County, six shell casings were recovered from the interior of the Mercedes, and investigators found Suggs’ Arizona driver’s license covered in blood.
Blood had pooled under the Mercedes, and there were blood spatters in the wheel well, leading investigators to conclude the victims had been killed elsewhere.
Investigators also found a receipt for the White Squirrel in St. Paul showing a purchase had been made by one of the victims at 1:38 a.m. on September 12.
Later on, witnesses would say they had seen Suggs at Shamrocks, located on Seventh Street West in St Paul with three of the victims, and then at the White Squirrel, located on Seventh Street West in St. Paul, with two of the victims.
Witnesses recall seeing the victims getting into the Mercedes.
Phone data shows that one of the victims created a contact for Suggs at 3:08 a.m. and that Suggs’ phone and the Mercedes remained parked until around 3:30 a.m.
Surveillance video from Seventh Street and Walnut Street in St. Paul showed the Mercedes at 3:48 a.m., and it appears one of the victims is already slumped over in the front passenger seat.
“Investigators believe that Suggs killed the four victims in the area of Seventh Street in St. Paul, Ramsey County, between 3:30 a.m. and 3:48 a.m. on September 12, 2021,” according to the statement of probable cause.
More surveillance
Other surveillance videos show the victim clearly slumped over in the front seat.
Surveillance video from the Holiday gas station on Snelling Avenue north, for example, shows the Mercedes at a gas pump at 9:48 a.m., and “NF-P is clearly slumped over in the front passenger seat in the same position in which her body was found in Wisconsin. Suggs got out of the Mercedes-Benz and entered the store. Suggs is clearly identifiable on the store’s surveillance video since he did not wear a face covering,” according to the statement of probable cause.
September of 2021 was during the height of the Covid pandemic, and many people were wearing face masks to help prevent transmission of the disease.
Suggs’ and Osborne’s phones only received incoming calls between 10:13 a.m. and 11:16 a.m., and the phones never physically moved past the area of Lexington Parkway and I-94. The two of them left their cell phones behind in Minnesota when they drove to Wisconsin in the Mercedes and the Nissan, according to the statement of probable cause.
When Osborne agreed to talk to investigators, he told them that he had followed Suggs around to various gas stations in St. Paul, that Suggs had told his father “he snapped and shot a couple people,” and that Suggs said the shooting happened in the vehicle on Seventh Street.
Osborne denied knowing the bodies of the people his son had shot were in the vehicle that he and Suggs had abandoned in the corn field.
