An Arden Hills bar owner was sentenced to six months in jail and five years of probation Friday for stashing a gun his friend used to fatally shoot a man during a fight inside the business, then lying to investigators by claiming the shooting was not captured on video surveillance.
James Henrey Welsch, 49, of Vadnais Heights, pleaded guilty in June to felony aiding an offender after the fact in connection with the March 2022 shooting at Welsch’s Big Ten Tavern. As part of Welsch’s plea agreement, attorneys agreed that the felony offense should be ranked at a severity level of seven, resulting in a stayed prison sentence and probation.
James Henrey Welsch, left, and Eric Eugene Baker (Courtesy of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)
Eric Baker, 47, of Minneapolis, who shot 36-year-old Dustin Kukowski, of Mounds View, was given an 11-year prison term in March after pleading guilty to first-degree manslaughter.
At sentencing, Ramsey County District Judge Joy Bartscher granted a request from Welsch’s attorney, Thomas Kelly, for a stay of imposition, which means the felony conviction will be deemed a misdemeanor as long as Welsch successfully follows terms of his supervised probation.
Kelly wrote in a Tuesday court filing that Welsch hid Baker’s gun “while in an extremely intoxicated condition” and that Welsch is a “good parent, a good partner to his companion … a good employer” and “is the type of person deserving” of a stay of imposition.
“Importantly, with a Stay of Imposition, the bar license might be preserved,” Kelly added.
He apologized for lying
Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office deputies were called to the bar at 4703 U.S. Highway 10 around 12:30 a.m. March 25, 2022, and saw a patron holding napkins to Kukowski’s chest. He was taken to Regions Hospital in St. Paul, where doctors performed several surgeries to try to save his life. The father of two died April 5.
A bar patron told deputies he saw Baker and Kukowski fighting before the shooting. Deputies recovered a 9mm casing from the bar and later arrested Baker at a Roseville hotel. He declined to speak to authorities.
Welsch told deputies he was downstairs at the bar when the shooting happened. He was evasive when asked about Baker and denied having a phone number for him, according to the criminal complaint.
Dustin Kukowski (Courtesy of Debbie Kukowski)
Deputies found images on Facebook that showed Welsch and Baker together at the Minnesota Wild game earlier that night. Welsch then admitted he had a phone number for Baker and gave it to deputies.
Welsch agreed to let deputies look at the bar’s surveillance system. The equipment did not appear to be powered up, and Welsch said he was in the middle of construction projects and that he had not used his camera system for a while.
Later that day, an investigator took a call from someone who wanted to remain anonymous and said that Welsch and Baker are “best friends” and that the bar’s surveillance video system worked, the complaint says.
A bartender later told investigators she grabbed the gun off the bar top after the shooting so that no one else would be hurt. She said she brought it to the kitchen and showed Welsch, who took the gun downstairs.
Four days after the shooting, Welsch reported finding the Glock 9mm under trash bins at the bar. The handgun did not have a magazine when an investigator recovered it.
Welsch later that day said he didn’t remember much from the night of the shooting because he was drunk.
Investigators told Welsch that they knew he had taken possession of the gun that night. Welsch then admitted he grabbed the gun from a kitchen counter, unloaded it and hid it in the basement rafters. He said he later put the gun outside to get some distance from it, and apologized for not telling deputies where it was on the night of the shooting.
Investigators opened the bar’s digital video recorder and discovered the hard drive had been disconnected from its contact site. Investigators cloned Welsch’s network video recorder and found video that stopped about a half-hour after the shooting.
Probation includes AA meetings
Judge Bartscher ordered that Welsch serve at least one month of his six-month jail sentence in custody. He can serve the rest of the time on programs the workhouse deems him eligible for, such as electronic-home monitoring.
The judge approved an Oct. 1 turn-in date for Welsch to begin the sentence, and he will be given credit for the two days he served in custody after his arrest and before he was released after posting a $10,000 bond.
Bartscher ordered that Welsch continue to go to at least one Alcoholics Anonymous meeting weekly while on probation.
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