A jury has convicted a 38-year-old St. Paul man of raping a woman at his home in March shortly after they met on a dating app.

Jurors last week after a two-day trial found Green Isiah Kelly Jr. guilty of third-degree criminal sexual conduct, but acquitted him of the more severe first-degree criminal sexual conduct charge. He remains jailed ahead of his Oct. 31 sentencing. His attorney did not respond to messages Thursday by the Pioneer Press asking for comment on the verdict.

Green Isiah Kelly Jr. (Courtesy of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)

Kelly was a convicted sex offender at the time of the March 23 rape in St. Paul’s Summit-University area. In 2013, he pleaded guilty to third-degree criminal sexual conduct for raping a woman who had passed out from alcohol at a party in St. Paul, court records show.

He was sentenced to 15 years in prison, followed by 10 years of conditional release. Most people sent to prison in Minnesota serve two-thirds of their sentence in custody and the remaining on supervised release in the community.

Kelly was given an additional 15 months in prison in 2020 for repeatedly punching a fellow inmate in the face at Minnesota Correctional Facility-Faribault, according to court records. He was put on intensive supervised release in September.

According to the March 25 criminal complaint:

A 37-year-old woman from Menomonie, Wis., reported to police about 4:15 p.m. March 23 that she had been sexually assaulted less than two hours earlier at a home in the 800 block of Aurora Avenue. She identified the suspect as “Isiah,” who was later identified as Kelly.

She told police she had met Kelly through a dating app about a month earlier, and that they then texted and made Facetime calls to each other.

She said the first time she saw Kelly she realized the photos he had posted on the dating app were not of him. She questioned him about that and he admitted as much. She said she told Kelly that she wasn’t interested in dating him, but was willing to be friends. They then talked casually.

Kelly asked if they could get together, and she said she was coming into town on March 23. Around 11:30 a.m., she agreed to cut his hair and beard, and went to his home on Aurora Avenue to meet him. He took her to a local restaurant. While there, he said he wanted to be in a relationship with her, but she told him she wasn’t interested.

When they returned to Kelly’s home, he asked her to come inside to cut his hair and offered to pay her to do so. “(The woman) was suspicious because (Kelly) was bald,” the complaint states, adding that he then said he’d pay her full price of a haircut if she would trim his beard.

When she and Kelly went into his bedroom, where she thought she was going to trim his beard, he said, “Let’s get down to business” and grabbed her arm and began to kiss her on the neck, the complaint states. She told police she pushed him away and told him, “Not that type of business” and repeated that she did not want to be in a relationship with him and did not want to engage in sex.

Kelly then grabbed her by the arm and threw her on the bed. He ripped off her shirt, pants and underwear and pinned his body against hers as she screamed and kicked at him. She told police she repeatedly yelled, “No! I don’t want to have sex with you!” the complaint says. He then raped her.

Kelly stopped when his phone rang and someone knocked on the door, she told police. When he answered the door in his boxer briefs, she grabbed her torn shirt and pants but could not find her underwear. She tried to leave the room with one pant leg on but Kelly met her at the bedroom door and told her not to go. She was able to get past him and leave the home.

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The woman drove directly to a hospital in Wisconsin. As she drove, Kelly called her multiple times. She recorded their conversations and provided them to police. Kelly apologized for not listening to her and said he let his “hormones speak for [him],” the complaint states. She told him that she had said “no” and yelled at him that what he did was “definitely not OK.”

After his arrest, Kelly underwent a suspect sexual assault examination. He declined to talk to investigators, saying that he wanted a lawyer.

Prosecutors filed an amended complaint in July, adding the first-degree sexual assault charge. The complaint includes details of her sexual assault exam, when she reportedly repeated how she pleaded for him to stop and said he also put his hand over her mouth to keep her from screaming.

By RUSS BYNUM

SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — U.S. immigration authorities on Thursday raided the sprawling site where Hyundai manufactures electric vehicles in southeast Georgia, conducting a search that shut down construction on an adjacent factory being built to produce EV batteries.

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The operation targeted one of Georgia’s largest and most high-profile manufacturing sites, touted by the governor and other officials as the largest economic development project in the state’s history. Hyundai Motor Group began manufacturing EVs a year ago at the $7.6 billion plant, which employs about 1,200 people.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman Lindsay Williams confirmed that federal authorities were conducting an enforcement operation at the 3,000-acre site west of Savannah. He said agents were focused on the construction site for the battery plant.

The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that agents executed a search warrant “as part of an ongoing criminal investigation into allegations of unlawful employment practices and other serious federal crimes.” It did not say whether anyone was detained or arrested.

Georgia State Patrol troopers blocked roads to the Hyundai site. The Georgia Department of Public Safety confirmed they were dispatched to assist federal authorities.

Video posted to social media Thursday showed workers in yellow safety vests lined up as a man wearing a face mask and a tactical vest with the letters HSI, which stands for Homeland Security Investigations, tells them: “We’re Homeland Security. We have a search warrant for the whole site.”

“We need construction to cease immediately,” the man says. “We need all work to end on the site right now.”

President Donald Trump’s administration has undertaken sweeping ICE operations as part of a mass deportation agenda. Immigration officers have raided farms, construction sites, restaurants and auto repair shops.

The Pew Research Center, citing preliminary Census Bureau data, says the U.S. labor force lost more than 1.2 million immigrants from January through July. That includes people who are in the country illegally as well as legal residents.

In addition to making electric vehicles at the site facing Interstate 16 in Bryan County, Hyundai has also partnered with LG Energy Solution to build the battery plant. It’s slated to open sometime next year.

The joint venture, HL-GA Battery Company, “is cooperating fully with the appropriate authorities,” the company said in a statement. “To assist their work, we have paused construction.”

Operations at Hyundai’s EV manufacturing plant weren’t interrupted, said plant spokesperson Bianca Johnson.

“This did not impact people getting to work,” Johnson said in an email. “Production and normal office hours had already begun for the day” when authorities shut down access.

By TODD RICHMOND

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — An immigrant who allegedly evaded federal agents with the help of a Milwaukee County judge pleaded guilty Thursday to being in the U.S. illegally.

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Federal prosecutors charged Eduardo Flores-Ruiz in April with reentering the country illegally after being deported. He faces up to two years in prison when he’s sentenced and agreed to be deported whenever he is released, according to a summary of the plea deal he reached with prosecutors.

Online court records did not list a sentencing date. His attorney, Martin J. Pruhs, didn’t immediately respond to an email from The Associated Press on Thursday afternoon seeking comment.

According to court documents, Flores-Ruiz first entered the United States illegally near Nogales, Arizona, in January 2013. He was arrested the next day and deported. He subsequently returned to the U.S. without permission and was charged this past March in Milwaukee with misdemeanor domestic battery.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents learned Flores-Ruiz was in the country after the Milwaukee County jail submitted his fingerprints to federal databases. Agents traveled to the county courthouse on April 18, planning to arrest him as he appeared for a hearing in the case.

Judge Hannah Dugan, who was presiding over the battery case, learned that agents were in the building looking for Flores-Ruiz. According to an FBI affidavit, witnesses heard Dugan say something to the effect of “wait, come with me” to Flores-Ruiz and his attorney before showing them out a courtroom door typically used only by deputies, jurors, court staff and in-custody defendants. Flores-Ruiz made his way outside the building, but agents captured him following a foot chase.

The FBI arrested Dugan in April and a federal grand jury indicted her weeks later on charges of obstruction and concealing an individual to prevent arrest. The state Supreme Court suspended her from the bench after her arrest.

Dugan has argued that she was acting in her official capacity as a judge and is therefore immune from prosecution. She’s set to stand trial in December and faces up to six years in prison if convicted on both counts.

Dugan’s arrest and indictment intensified a clash between President Donald Trump’s administration and local authorities over the Republican’s sweeping immigration crackdown. Democrats accused the Trump administration of trying to make an example of Dugan to blunt judicial opposition to the crackdown.

Flores-Ruiz still faces three misdemeanor counts of domestic battery in Milwaukee County. He is set to stand trial in that case on Oct. 13.

UCare is looking to suspend its Medicare Advantage offerings, the insurer announced Thursday.

UCare, a Minneapolis-based health insurance nonprofit, made a request to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services “to mutually terminate its Medicare Advantage product offerings for 2026,” according to a news release from the insurer.

“This decision was not made lightly,” said Hilary Marden-Resnik, UCare president and CEO, in the release. “UCare remains deeply committed to the health of Minnesotans and to supporting members through upcoming transitions.”

UCare currently has 158,000 Medicare Advantage members and is the second-largest Medicare Advantage carrier in the market with 26% market share, according to the release.

The nonprofit cites the cost of health care and increasing challenges of the overall market in its decision. “To maintain financial stability and continue providing quality, affordable coverage, UCare is aiming to focus its resources on programs where it can have the most impact,” the release states.

Pending approval of the request, impacted members would need to select new coverage during the upcoming annual enrollment period. Medical Assistance (Medicaid), MinnesotaCare, Special Needs Plans, individual and family plans and Medicare Supplement will still be offered.

The change will affect 9% of UCare’s workforce, per the release.

Thursday’s announcement comes just two months after the insurer announced its plans to withdraw from non-senior Medicaid coverage in Ramsey County and 11 others, affecting 88,000 members.

Founded in 1984 by physicians from the University of Minnesota, today UCare serves more than 600,000 members throughout Minnesota and parts of western Wisconsin.

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