Citing self-defense, Ramsey County prosecutors are declining charges in the fatal stabbing in St. Paul

Ramsey County prosecutors will not file charges against a St. Paul man who stabbed another at a Lowertown gas station, saying evidence shows his self-defense claims were plausible.

In a letter sent to the St. Paul Police Department on Wednesday, prosecutors declined to charge the 60-year-old man suspected of stabbing 35-year-old Derameo Johnson on Oct. 11. According to prosecutors, Johnson behaved erratically in the moments leading up to the incident, attacking the man who had few places to turn. The Minnesota Star Tribune is not naming the man because there are no charges against him.

“Given Johnson’s aggressive behavior, a jury would not convict based on these facts. We can’t prove that [the suspect] “I did NOT act in self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt given these facts,” the letter from the Ramsey County District Attorney’s Office said. “[He] had no way of escaping as Johnson kept coming back into the store and staying outside in the parking lot when he was not in the store.”

The stabbing suspect told police he was riding his bike to the Amoco gas station to get a drink on Oct. 11 when he noticed Johnson’s strange behavior. Surveillance footage showed Johnson running into traffic an hour earlier, and a store employee kicked Johnson out earlier in the day for “unpredictable behavior and disrupting business operations.” That employee asked a co-worker for pepper spray when Johnson “got in his face,” but the co-worker said, “Pepper spray wouldn’t work on Johnson because they had used it on Johnson.” [him] before.”

The suspect offered to buy Johnson water, but Johnson became hostile and yelled at the man before leaving the store. Johnson returned as the man exited the bathroom, hit him in the head and walked away.

The suspect then produced a pocket knife, but Johnson returned. He threw the suspect’s bike at him and hit the man in the head again. The man then stabbed Johnson twice.

Both fought over the knife before Johnson left the store wounded. The man asked the clerk to call the police and he took off his shirt so someone could use it on Johnson’s wound.

“[He] said he didn’t want Johnson to die, but he didn’t want Johnson to beat this [expletive] also out of him,” the letter says.