A 17-year-old is charged with multiple felonies after deputies carried out a search warrant last week and found eight firearms in his bedroom in St. Paul and another gun in a bag he was carrying, according to a court document filed Tuesday.
The Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office Gun Unit had a warrant for the home in the 900 block of Burr Street in Payne-Phalen to look for illegal firearms and related items. They executed the warrant about 11:15 a.m. Friday.
“Deputies surveilled the house until the primary suspect came outside and jumped into a parked car,” according to a Facebook post from the sheriff’s office. “That’s when they nabbed him. With the element of surprise on their side, they swooped in and arrested the 17-year-old so he couldn’t get access to the weapons.”
The teen was wearing a cross-body bag and an investigator found a Glock handgun inside with an extended magazine, laser sight and auto-sear device/switch, according to a juvenile petition filed by the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office. The switch converts a firearm into “a fully automatic machine gun” and investigators later test fired the gun and confirmed it was functioning as such, the petition said.
During the search of the teen’s bedroom, investigators found seven additional handguns and a short-barrel rifle, which had no serial number, the petition said. They also located a bullet-resistant garment, a gym bag with three empty magazines inside, a firearm receipt, ammunition and an auto sear not installed on a firearm.
The teen talked to investigators, “acknowledged possession of the found firearms and boasted about his ‘collection,’” according to the petition.
Teen remains in custody
The petition filed in Ramsey County District Court charges him with possession of a machine gun and of a firearm without a serial number. He is also charged with nine counts of possession of a firearm by a person under age 18. The county attorney’s office will seek to have the teen tried in adult court, the petition states.
The teen turns 18 soon, so “this was a couple weeks away from being a totally different case,” Ramsey County Judge Jacob Kraus said at his court appearance Tuesday.
Assistant Ramsey County Attorney George Joyer requested the teen stay in custody, saying the machine gun charge is “a very serious offense,” in addition “to the high volume of other weapons and additional accessories” found.
Multiple surveillance video displays are seen on a monitor inside a home where the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office carried out a search warrant Friday. There were high-end surveillance cameras outside of the home, according to the sheriff’s office. (Courtesy of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)
The house had high-end surveillance equipment, the sheriff’s office post said.
The teen’s attorney, Ellen Seesel, said he requested to go home with his mother on electronic monitoring and “strict house arrest” because he wanted to go back to school. He’s due to graduate in a week or two, and the teen’s father told Seesel that he’s starting a program soon that means a lot to him.
Kraus decided the teen will remain at the Ramsey County Juvenile Detention Center. “I have significant public safety concerns about what they found, the amount of things they found, and the type of things that they found,” the judge said.
Previous gun case
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The teen had another gun case just over a year ago. The Pioneer Press is not naming him because of his age and because the current case is still in juvenile court.
The Ramsey County Attorney’s Office charged him in February 2024 with threats of violence. He was at the Wilder Recreation Center in St. Paul that month when someone saw him and another juvenile playing dice, and told them they needed to leave the building. The person said the juvenile, who was later identified as the teen in the current case, told him, “What are you going to do about it?” and pulled out a pistol, according to the juvenile petition in that case.
He was found guilty of a felony, ordered to complete 24 hours of community service and was on supervised probation until December. The case was then dismissed because he met conditions, the court docket shows.
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