3 Charged In Murder Outside St. Paul Auto Body Store

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – Three people have been charged in connection with a shooting that took place outside an auto body store in St. Paul earlier this month.

Daryl Negel Curtis, 25, Antionette Rie Johnson, 30, and Tameka Rae Smithson, 37, were all charged in connection with the murder Friday, which took place outside of an O'Reilly Auto Parts on Lexington Parkway on June 12. All three were charged with second degree murder, according to a Ramsey County Court.

According to the criminal complaint, the victim left O'Reilly after purchasing a fuse just after 8 p.m. on June 12. While he was installing the fuse, a maroon SUV pulled into the parking lot. A man exited the vehicle and shot the victim once.

When the victim fell to the ground, the man shot him two more times before running from the parking lot. The victim's cousin told police the shooter was about 6 feet tall with a large build.

Surveillance footage from a nearby daycare showed the man exiting the SUV, walking in the direction of O'Reilly and returning to the SUV. Johnson later identified the man exiting the SUV as Curtis.

Police also obtained images from a surveillance camera at a nearby Walmart, which showed Curtis, Johnson and Smithson entering the store just after 7 p.m. on June 12. Curtis was wearing a similar shirt to the man on the daycare video.

Curtis denied the man in the Walmart footage was him. Curtis told police he did not know where he was on the date of the murder because he drinks and smokes weed every day, the complaint states.

Smithson told police Curtis asked her and Johnson to drop him off near the auto body store and called later to be picked up at an alley near the store.

A phone call between Johnson and Jumoke Cryer, an inmate whom investigation revealed the victim was in a dispute with, further connected the three to the homicide. Texts found on Curtis' and Smithson's phones discussing the murder also connected the three.

Curtis has a prior murder conviction in Ramsey County for shooting a man in the chest at close range.

Prosecutors will ask for a bail of $1.5 million for Curtis and $500,000 each for Johnson and Smithson.