7 October 2024
CARLTON — A man was sentenced Monday to more than eight years in prison for severely assaulting a fellow board and lodge resident with an improvised weapon.
Jacob Robert Clarin, 38, admitted to using a club consisting of a railroad spike taped to a chair leg to beat the victim at Lake Venoah Board and Lodge in Twin Lakes Township, just south of Carlton, on Feb. 21.
Clarin in August pleaded guilty to first-degree assault, with the Carlton County Attorney’s Office agreeing to dismiss another count of attempted intentional second-degree murder.
Court documents indicate a staff member at the facility, which offers supportive services for men with alcohol and drug use disorders, called 911 to report that Clarin had assaulted another resident and left.
Carlton County sheriff’s deputies found the victim, Christopher Corwin Buchholz, 44, bleeding from wounds to his forehead, scalp and back of his neck. He was taken to Community Memorial Hospital and required roughly 40 stitches.
Buchholz told deputies he had gone to the bathroom and was returning to his room when he heard another door open and was struck over the head with an object. He was hit several times before he managed to get back in his room, locking the door as the assailant tried to break in.
A criminal complaint said the victim had only been at the facility for two days and that Clarin had yelled at him on his first day. Buchholz said he did not know the defendant, but Clarin seemed to believe he had “done him some wrong in the past.”
During the assault, Clarin allegedly yelled, “You’re the guy. I know it’s you.”
Deputies said they recovered three broken pieces of the shaft weapon at the scene. Held together by electrical tape, it included a section with two curved metal pieces pointing outward, along with the railroad spike affixed to the top.
Officers, meanwhile, began a search for Clarin, going to the adjacent lake, where he was known to fish. The complaint says a drone team was called in and ultimately located him on the thin ice.
Clarin reportedly made several spontaneous comments about the attack, saying he “wanted to kill” Buchholz and implying he had done him wrong in the past. In his room, investigators also found broken items and scribblings on the wall that were understood to reference the attack.
Clarin has been civilly committed as mentally ill and/or chemically dependent on four occasions in Minnesota since 2007. His mother explained in a recent letter to the court that he suffered a brain injury in a 2005 car crash, leaving him to “struggle and be misunderstood his whole life.”
Clarin told the judge Monday that he doesn’t consider himself a violent person, but that he “felt in danger” and “had to protect myself.”
“I’m very, very sorry, and I really wish things would have happened totally different,” he said. “I can’t change anything, but if I could, I’d never relive that night.”
Judge Rebekka Stumme, however, noted Clarin has a number of prior assault convictions on his record. She said she doesn’t doubt that he is a vulnerable adult, but that his reaction to feeling cornered is to “act out in a violent way.”
“At your plea hearing, you acknowledged there were other options than what you ended up deciding to do,” the judge said, “and that’s what you’re going to need to focus on when you get out of prison for this event.”
Clarin must serve a little less than six years of the 104-month term before he will be eligible for supervised release.
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