Teen Shot With Birdshot in Saint Paul, 19-Year-Old Arrested

Jul 3

A 19-year-old suspect is charged after allegedly firing birdshot at a teen boy outside a Saint Paul apartment Wednesday, with police confirming the gun used was reported stolen last year.

According to court documents, officers were first dispatched to the 1500 block of Magnolia Avenue East around 2:40 p.m. on July 2 after a report of a shooting, but they were unable to locate a victim and eventually cleared the scene.

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About 30 minutes later, they returned to the same block for a report of property damage and were flagged down by a woman who appeared frantic. She told officers her 16-year-old son had been shot and was in the backseat of her vehicle.

At first, the teenager told officers he hadn’t been shot. But police saw small red marks on the left side of his body and determined he had been hit by birdshot. Medics and firefighters responded, transporting him to Regions Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

The teen told officers he had been lying in bed inside his apartment when he heard glass break. He looked outside and saw two girls running, then noticed a window in his apartment had been shattered. He stepped outside to confront whoever was responsible and saw two people he recognized—one of them, he said, was “Darius,” later identified as 19-year-old Darius Junior Smith, of Saint Paul.

According to the teen, Smith raised a shotgun and fired it at him. The teen said he ran to another apartment building and called his mother, who picked him up and started driving him to the hospital before spotting nearby squad cars and flagging officers down.

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The teen later told investigators that earlier in the day, around noon, he had been smoking marijuana in one of the apartment units with Smith and another person. He said they had not been fighting, the documents say, and after returning to his own apartment and lying down, the victim said the shot rang out.

Smith and the other male were later found inside one of the apartment units. Police say they knocked and announced their presence but got no response until two males eventually came out and were detained. One of them had injuries consistent with being pistol-whipped. Smith initially declined to give names but told officers his cousin had been robbed and that he’d called the cousin’s father after it happened.

According to Smith’s version of events, the teen victim—who lived next door—had come over to the apartment earlier with two other males and allegedly robbed and assaulted his cousin. Smith said the robbery happened about two hours before officers arrived and claimed he never left the apartment afterward. He said he heard gunshots later but didn’t know anyone had been shot and denied involvement in the shooting. Smith told officers he didn’t know why the teen would accuse him. He also said the shotgun in his apartment had been brought there by someone else months earlier, but admitted he may have handled it and that his DNA could be on the weapon.

Police obtained a search warrant for the apartment unit and found a 12-gauge shotgun hidden under a mattress. The shotgun was loaded with a shell containing birdshot, the court documents say, and a check of the serial number revealed it had been reported stolen in Washington County in June 2023.

Smith was arrested at the scene and taken to the Ramsey County Jail. He provided a DNA sample and is charged with 2nd-degree assault, with bail set Thursday at $200,000.

Authorities have not released the name of the 16-year-old victim and the case remains under investigation.

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