On April 14, 2026, at 0735 hours, St. Paul police officers responded to 175 10th St. E., Drury Plaza Hotel, St. Paul, Ramsey County, to take a report about a stolen vehicle. CJB, [DOB REDACTED], stated that his 2025 black Ford Explorer with South Dakota plates had been taken without his permission between 2200 hours on April 13, and 0730 hours, on April 14, 2026. GPS last tracked the vehicle to Midway Hotel, [ADDRESS REDACTED], St. Paul. Police located the vehicle in Inver Grove Heights, [ADDRESS REDACTED]. They arrested the driver, Muhammed Lee Porter, [DOB REDACTED]. He had the key fob in his pocket.
Surveillance video from local stores showed Porter getting in and out of the driver’s seat of the vehicle. CJB arrived with St. Paul police and stated that the car had drug paraphernalia in it that did not belong to him. He also noted that a box of 20 rounds of Blazer ammunition had been removed from his glove box, where he had stored it, and it had been placed in the passenger compartment of the vehicle in plain view. Two children’s car seats had been removed from the vehicle and were not located.
CJB said that he must have inadvertently left his spare key fob in the center console of the vehicle. In a post-Miranda interview, Porter denied being in the vehicle and he denied driving the vehicle. When confronted with security video showing him in the vehicle and his possession of the key fob, he changed his story. He said that he encountered a female at 0700 hours who told him to get in the vehicle. He said that she provided him with the keys. He drove to the Hamline area in St. Paul to look for drugs.
He denied knowledge of the box of ammunition in plain view inside the vehicle. He also denied knowing that the vehicle was stolen. Porter is ineligible to possess ammunition due to a conviction for Aggravated Robbery in the First Degree in 2018 in 27CR1714010.
