25 July 2024
A jury has convicted a New Hope man of attempted murder and other charges for a drive-by shooting that critically wounded a 10-year-old boy as he celebrated New Year’s Eve with his family in their St. Paul home last year.
Prosecutors argued during the five-day trial of Morris Robert Chie Ryan that the 37-year-old targeted the home in the 700 block of Sherburne Avenue in St. Paul’s Frogtown neighborhood with a flurry of bullets, one of which struck the boy in the abdomen. He was taken to Regions Hospital “with a life-threatening injury and acute blood loss.”
Kelci Marie Meyers and Morris Robert Chie Ryan (Courtesy of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)
Jurors deliberated Monday afternoon and Tuesday morning before finding Ryan guilty of all six charges against him. Sentencing is scheduled for Oct. 11.
Ryan’s attorney, Adam Goldfine, did not return messages Wednesday seeking comment on the verdict.
Ryan’s getaway driver, Kelci Marie Meyers, was sentenced to 15 years in prison last month after a jury in April found her guilty of aiding and abetting attempted murder, aiding and abetting first-degree assault and aiding and abetting drive-by shooting.
Meyers, 29, testified at her trial that she was driving the SUV and that Ryan was leaning out of the passenger window when she heard the gunshots. She did not say she saw Ryan fire a gun.
At the time of the shooting, Ryan and Meyers were in a relationship, according to police.
Officers called to the shooting just before midnight found the boy in an upstairs bedroom with a gunshot wound. The bullet punctured his bladder, small intestine and bowel before exiting his buttock.
The boy’s mother told police she was in the kitchen making a video to celebrate the New Year with her son and other children. Her son had been playing with Legos shortly before gunshots came through the kitchen window.
She heard a man in the alley say, “(Expletive) y’all, (expletive)” and tried to get her kids out of the kitchen, the charges said. Another child carried the boy to the upstairs bedroom.
The boy’s mother told police she suspected that a former neighbor was behind the shooting. The mother said the man, identified in the charges as LC, was “a neighborhood nuisance” and, although he’d moved out, “he continued to return, causing trouble and threatening the residents” of her home. She had a harassment restraining order against LC, though the order hadn’t been served on him.
Meyers used to date LC’s cousin and she also lived with them on Sherburne Avenue, according to police.
In video surveillance from the area, an SUV could be seen circling the alley twice before the shooting and about 14 gunshots could be heard. It was the only vehicle in the alley at the time.
Investigators found video surveillance from a nearby gas station that showed the SUV entering the lot just after the shooting. Police identified Ryan as the person who exited the front passenger seat and Meyers as the person who got out from the driver’s seat. They purchased beverages from the gas station and used Meyers’ card to pay.
Cellphone data showed Ryan’s phone on Sherburne Avenue at the time of the shooting and then at the Lexington Parkway gas station.
Police found seven handguns at Meyers’ home, including a Glock 9mm that testing of a shell casing recovered from Sherburne Avenue later showed fired the bullets.
Ryan told police he didn’t “really recall what he did on New Year’s Eve.” He said he’d stayed in and watched YouTube videos at his mother’s house in New Hope. He requested a lawyer.
In addition to second-degree attempted murder, jurors found Ryan guilty of aiding and abetting first-degree assault, aiding and abetting drive-by shooting and three counts of second-degree assault.
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