A man found guilty of assaulting a Roseville police officer at a Walmart was sentenced to three years of probation this week.

Collin Scott Magnuson, 32, of St. Paul, received a sentence of one year in prison, which was stayed for three years, and a 77-day sentence, which he’s already served.

State sentencing guidelines did not call for prison time, though the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office asked that he be sentenced to more jail time. Magnuson’s attorney, Thomas E. Harmon V, argued against it during Monday’s hearing.

Magnuson opted for a bench trial and Ramsey County District Court Judge Maria Mitchell ruled in May that he was guilty of fourth-degree assault of a peace officer causing demonstrable bodily harm and not guilty of third-degree assault causing substantial bodily harm.

Harmon wrote in a closing argument to the court that the case “is about the unfortunate convergence of two people battling their respective demons. Mr. Magnuson battles alcohol” and he noted that Roseville Sgt. Ryan Duxbury sustained a traumatic brain injury when he was shot in the line of duty in 2022.

“On March 5th, 2025, they both lost, and we as a society are the worst for it,” Harmon wrote. “Mr. Magnuson does not pretend that his poor decision making before he entered Walmart that evening didn’t lead to this encounter. That does not mean he broke the law. That does not mean he was looking for a fight. That does not mean he deserved to be slammed to the ground.

“It means he has the right to hold the government to its burden of demonstrating proof beyond a reasonable doubt,” Harmon continued. “The government has failed to meet its burden.”

But Assistant Ramsey County Attorney Allison Fredrickson wrote that Duxbury “was using the de-escalation techniques that he had been taught: to talk to Mr. Magnuson, to use a calm voice, to give warnings and ask him to do things, like enter the office. Mr. Magnuson was told that he would be handcuffed if he did not comply. Immediately, Mr. Magnuson said no and pushed his weight into Sgt. Duxbury and grabbed his jacket, as if to leave.

“Sgt. Duxbury did not slam Mr. Magnuson to the ground,” she continued. “He testified that he grabbed his arm to handcuff him and when he did not comply, he tried to get him in the best position to put him in handcuffs to detain him. Sgt. Duxbury was doing his job, he was asked to assist in the apprehension of a shoplifting suspect.”

Fredrickson also noted there was no evidence presented at trial that Magnuson was under the influence.

On March 5, a Walmart asset protection officer saw Magnuson, who was at self-checkout, didn’t scan all the items he selected and then began walking out of the Roseville store, Mitchell wrote in a court document about her findings of fact.

Duxbury was working contracted overtime at Walmart and was notified by loss prevention about the suspected theft.

From the assault, Duxbury sustained cuts and bruising on his hand, had bruising on his face and experienced headaches, Mitchell wrote. He went to the doctor and did not receive a diagnosis of a concussion.

“It’s unfortunate that people, while committing crimes, … think that it’s OK to assault a police officer,” Roseville Deputy Police Chief Joe Adams said Tuesday. “It should be clear that if you’re going to assault a police officer, we’re going to partner with the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office and hold you accountable.”

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By ALANNA DURKIN RICHER

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department is ramping up its plans to revoke the citizenship of immigrants who’ve committed crimes or pose a national security risk, according to a recent memo underscoring the Trump administration’s hardline immigration agenda.

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Efforts to identity and go after those suspected of cheating to get their citizenship are not new to this administration.

But the public push is raising concerns from advocates, who have accused the administration of trying to use immigration enforcement for political purposes. It’s receiving increased scrutiny after a Republican member of Congress suggested that Zohran Mamdani, the New York City Democratic mayoral candidate, should be subject to denaturalization proceedings.

Here’s a look at the denaturalization process and what the Justice Department’s memo means:

Denaturalization cases are rare

The U.S. government can strip a naturalized immigrant of their citizenship if they are criminally convicted of naturalization fraud or if the government proves through civil proceedings that they illegally obtained their citizenship through fraud or misrepresented or concealed facts on their application.

For years, the government’s denaturalization efforts focused largely on suspected war criminals who lied on their immigration paperwork, most notably former Nazis. The Justice Department filed just more than 300 total cases between 1990 and 2017.

An initiative that began under the Obama administration called Operation Janus expanded those efforts by seeking to identify people who had used different identities to get green cards and citizenship after they were previously issued deportation orders.

In 2016, an internal watchdog reported that 315,000 old fingerprint records for immigrants who had been deported or had criminal convictions had not been uploaded to a Department of Homeland Security database that is used to check immigrants’ identities. The same report found more than 800 immigrants had been ordered deported under one identity but became U.S. citizens under another.

The first Trump administration made such investigations a bigger priority, creating a Justice Department section focused on denaturalization cases.

But even then, the number of denaturalization cases remained small, as the administration didn’t have the resources to bring many amid an onslaught of legal challenges to immigration policies it had to defend against, said Matthew Hoppock, an attorney in Kansas who represents people in denaturalization cases.

Justice Department says it will prioritize certain cases

The push was announced in a memo from the recently confirmed head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division, Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate. Shumate said the cases the department will prioritize include people who “pose a potential danger to national security,” people who commit violent crimes, members of gangs and drug cartels and people who commit Medicaid fraud and other types of fraud.

The benefits of the denaturalization process, Shumate wrote, “include the government’s ability to revoke the citizenship of individuals who engaged in the commission of war crimes, extrajudicial killings, or other serious human rights abuses; to remove naturalized criminals, gang members, or, indeed, any individuals convicted of crimes who pose an ongoing threat to the United States; and to prevent convicted terrorists from returning to U.S. soil or traveling internationally on a U.S. passport.”

Hoppock said the memo sort of “blows the doors open” for the administration to file as many as many denaturalization cases as it has the resources to file.

Lawyers raise alarm about the potential impact

The broad language in the memo raises the prospect “that any offense, at any time, may be used to justify denaturalization,” said Christopher Wellborn, president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

“It is not difficult to imagine a scenario where the government invokes unsubstantiated claims of gang affiliation or uses an individual’s criminal record to claim that citizenship was illegally procured,” Wellborn said in a statement.

Others worry the administration’s public push will stoke fear among naturalized immigrants.

“The more you talk about it, the more you frame it as ‘we’re coming after your naturalization, we’re coming after you,’ the more of a chilling effect we see on people applying for naturalization,” said Elizabeth Taufa, senior policy attorney and strategist at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center. “Even those folks that really are eligible for naturalization.”

Critics have accused the Trump administration using immigration enforcement to go after people because of their speech — most notably in the case of Columbia University activist Mahmoud Khalil, whom it has sought to deport over his role in pro-Palestinian protests.

“One of our ongoing concerns is will they target these politically, will they start combing through people’s immigration files if they don’t like you or if they think you don’t agree with the government,” Hoppock said.

“I think most Americans would support the idea of stripping someone of citizenship if they got it through fraud and they are also a dangerous person,” he said, but the concern is if they start going through “regular folks’ immigration files to find a T that is not crossed or an I that is not dotted so they can use it as a weapon.”

Justice Department recently secured denaturalization in one case

The department last month announced that it had successfully secured the denaturalization of a man who was convicted of possessing child sexual abuse material.

The British man had become a U.S. citizen after enlisting in the U.S. Army under a provision that provides a pathway to citizenship for U.S. service members, officials said. He only listed a speeding ticket when asked on his naturalization application if he had “ever committed a crime or offense for which you were not arrested,” and he became a U.S. citizen in 2013.

Months later, he was arrested in Louisiana on child sexual abuse material charges and convicted, according to the department.

“The laws intended to facilitate citizenship for brave men and women who join our nation’s armed forces will not shield individuals who have fraudulently obtained U.S. citizenship by concealing their crimes,” Shumate said in a statement at the time. “If you commit serious crimes before you become a U.S. citizen and then lie about them during your naturalization process, the Justice Department will discover the truth and come after you.”

By CHRISTINE FERNANDO and SOPHIA TAREEN

CHICAGO (AP) — The son of notorious Mexican drug kingpin “El Chapo” intends to plead guilty to drug trafficking charges in the U.S., according to court documents filed Tuesday.

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Prosecutors allege Ovidio Guzman Lopez, along with his brother, Joaquin Guzman Lopez, ran a faction of the cartel known as the “Chapitos,” or little Chapos, that exported fentanyl to the United States.

Ovidio Guzman Lopez’s father is Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, the former leader of the Sinaloa cartel who smuggled mountains of cocaine and other drugs into the United States over 25 years.

Ovidio Guzman Lopez was arrested in Mexico in 2023 and extradited to the United States. He was charged in federal court in Chicago with money laundering, drug and firearm offenses.

He previously pleaded not guilty, but online court records indicate he is scheduled to appear in court on July 9 to change his plea as part of a deal with prosecutors. Court documents filed Tuesday indicate he intends to plead guilty after word of a possible deal was disclosed during an October hearing.

Ovidio Guzman Lopez would be the first of the brothers to enter a plea deal.

Joaquin Guzman Lopez is also in U.S. custody. He and another longtime Sinaloa leader, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, were arrested in July in Texas after they landed in the U.S. on a private plane. Joaquin Guzman Lopez has pleaded not guilty to charges including money laundering, drug dealing and conspiracy to distribute drugs. Zambada also pleaded not guilty.

The men’s dramatic capture prompted a surge in violence in Mexico’s northern state of Sinaloa as two factions of the Sinaloa cartel clashed.

Federal prosecutors and Ovidio Guzman Lopez’s attorney, listed in online court records as Jeffrey Lichtman, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

ST. CLOUD — A St. Cloud state patrol trooper died Sunday in an off-duty accident in South Dakota.

Minnesota State Patrol Trooper Mollie McClure died in the accident on Waubay Lake in Waubay, South Dakota, according to a news release from the Minnesota Department of Public Safety.

State patrol communications specialist Kyle Everson told St. Cloud LIVE on Tuesday that it was not a motor vehicle crash and deferred further questions about the incident to the Day County (S.D.) Sheriff’s Office.

St. Cloud LIVE left a message with the sheriff’s office on Tuesday afternoon.

McClure joined the state patrol in October 2021, and was assigned to the St. Cloud district, according to the news release. She was “a respected trooper, mentor and friend. Her professionalism, compassion, and commitment to service left a lasting impact on her colleagues and the community” according to the release.

In 2023, a video of her rescuing a baby deer trapped in a roadside fence went viral on social media.

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