After St. Paul police officers fatally shot a woman’s neighbor, officers put her in the back of a squad car for three hours, though her lawsuit said she wasn’t accused of anything and she asked to leave.

The St. Paul City Council approved a $210,000 settlement Wednesday to Jill Mollner, which will end her lawsuit alleging the city and its officers violated her constitutional rights to be free from unlawful imprisonment.

In December, the City Council signed off on a $380,000 settlement to Cordale Handy’s fiancée, Markeeta Johnson-Blakney, in the same lawsuit.

Immediately after officers shot Handy, police “grabbed Markeeta Johnson-Blakney and Jill Mollner and forced them into the back seats of police cars,” their attorney, Paul Bosman, said in a Wednesday statement. “Jill and Markeeta were not criminals, just witnesses to a police shooting. Despite their requests to leave, St. Paul Police held Jill and Markeeta incommunicado against their will for the rest of the night.”

With the city agreeing to pay $590,000 in total to the two women, “we hope that SPPD will start to show respect for the basic civil rights of the people of St Paul,” Bosman said.

St. Paul City Attorney Lyndsey Olson said they settled Mollner’s lawsuit “to avoid the costs and unpredictability of continued litigation. The city remains dedicated to protecting the rights of all persons through respectful service.”

Civil jury found officer wrongfully caused death

On March 15, 2017, St. Paul officers responded to a 911 call about Cordale Handy, 29, in Dayton’s Bluff. Officers Nathaniel Younce and Mikko Norman reported they saw Handy fall down backward, lower a gun and raise it briefly toward Norman. The officers said Handy raised the gun toward Norman a second time and they both shot him.

The officers were not criminally charged. Handy’s mother, Kimberly Handy-Jones, filed a federal lawsuit and it went to civil trial last year. A jury found that Younce, who fired just before Norman, violated Handy’s constitutional rights by using excessive force and that he wrongfully caused Handy’s death. They did not find Norman civilly liable.

The jury awarded $1.5 million in punitive damages and $10 million in compensatory damages. Last month, a federal judge reduced the compensatory damages to $2.5 million. Handy-Jones’ mother has until March 15 to decide whether to accept the new award or seek a new civil trial focused only on compensatory damages.

Lawsuit: Officers wouldn’t let woman leave squad

When the officers responded to the apartment building where Mollner, Handy and Johnson-Blakney lived, they spoke briefly with the two women. Johnson-Blakney told them Handy’s gun was broken.

Younce and Norman didn’t know before they shot Handy that he’d fired 16 gunshots at a couch in his apartment. Handy, who had taken a stimulant drug, was seeing people who weren’t there and thought they were hiding in the apartment, Johnson-Blakney testified during the civil trial. Handy wanted help, a Handy-Jones attorney said.

“A citizen calling for help should not have to pay the price I’ve had to pay,” Mollner said in a Wednesday statement. “Likewise, those we trust to protect and serve us should not have stolen the life of Cordale Handy, the young man who needed their help and protection that morning.”

Mollner and Johnson-Blakney followed the officers outside and witnessed them shoot Handy.

Another officer arrived and police put Mollner in the back of a squad at 2:29 a.m. The back doors of squad cars cannot be opened from the inside.

Mollner was “dressed in a flimsy robe,” her lawsuit said. She asked an officer at 2:35 a.m. to allow her to go to her apartment to get a tampon; he said she could not.

Another officer told her at 2:36 a.m. she had to go downtown to make a statement. He returned at 2:38 a.m. and offered to go to her apartment to get clothes, saying she couldn’t go with him or have her cell phone.

The officer returned at 2:44 a.m. with clothing and a tampon. She was “forced to change and put in a tampon in the back of a squad car,” the lawsuit continued.

Video from the squad showed Mollner “weeping and rocking” as Handy’s body was in the street outside. Mollner asked an officer to cover his body. He told her he couldn’t but offered to move her to his squad car around the corner, and he did.

Another squad camera showed Mollner exited a squad at St. Paul police headquarters at 5:20 a.m. She appeared on a camera in an interview room at 6:07 a.m. and left the room at 6:49 a.m.

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FORT MYERS, Fla. — When Twins pitcher Joe Ryan arrived to camp last year, the talk surrounding him was about his revamped slider and his split-change, both of which he had spent the offseason working on. This year, he has a new trick — well, actually an old one that he decided to pick back up again — that he has been working on: a two-seamer.

“When I was at Driveline, (director of pitching Chris) Langin was kind of like, ‘All right, this could be fun, whatever,’ ” Ryan said. “And I kind of took what I knew and what we had learned from some other pitches and applied the reverse concept, and it works and they like it and the team likes it. The hitters don’t seem to like it, so it’s great.”

Ryan, who threw three innings and gave up a solo home run in the Twins’ 7-1 win over the Boston Red Sox on Wednesday at Hammond Stadium, isn’t sure how much he’s going to use the pitch, but he figures to be mixing it in depending on the opposing lineup and whether he needs it on that given day.

An extra weapon for the fourth-year starter could be valuable as Ryan looks to build off of a 2023 season that started off so well before subsequently being interrupted by a groin injury that he tried to pitch through unsuccessfully for more than a month before notifying the Twins.

In the 15 games before the injury, Ryan had a 2.98 earned-run average, and opponents were hitting .203 off him. In the next seven games, opponents hit .336 and he gave up 31 runs in 32 1/3 innings (8.63 earned-run average) before he landed on the injured list. Though he returned for the final month of the 2023 season, he never quite regained his early-season form, finishing the year with a 4.51 ERA in 29 games.

The key to his consistency throughout the full season, his manager Rocco Baldelli said, will be how well he can execute his secondary pitches.

“He has always relied and gone back to that good fastball, the good upshoot fastball that he uses. But you definitely need to keep developing those other pitches and pay a lot of attention to them, and he is. And that’s what he has been spending his (time on in) camp — he did the same thing last year,” said. “He came in with some new pitches. Having those pitches very consistent and under his full command, that’s the important part. So that’s going to be a big part of his success.”

Tinkering around with a pitch he used to throw — Ryan said his dad originally taught him how to throw a two-seamer as a child, and it wasn’t really until high school that he started throwing the four-seam fastball — is exactly how he can accomplish that.

It started with him kind of joking around, he said. And now?

“It’s a great pitch to add to the arsenal,” Ryan said. “I don’t know what that usage looks like throughout the course of the season, but it’s a fun pitch to have in my back pocket when I need it, and it’s a fun pitch to throw.”

Twins make first cuts

The Twins made their first round of cuts on Wednesday, reassigning pitchers Jovani Morán, Randy Dobnak, Ronny Henriquez and Ryan Jenson to minor league camp, as well as catchers Alex Isola and Pat Winkel, infielder Aaron Sabato and outfielder DaShawn Keirsey Jr. None of the eight were on the 40-man roster.

Some, like Morán, who is rehabbing from Tommy John surgery, are hurt. Some, Baldelli said, are younger players who they just want to go get the game reps that they need to get ready.

“Henriquez and Jensen, they need to go pitch. They just need to get out there and pitch and work on specific things. It’s harder to do that here,” Baldelli said. “The longer you’re in camp, the longer you think, ‘Well, there’s a chance. I may have an opportunity here to make this club.’ And them working on themselves and their pitches and getting themselves ready is just much more important right now.”

The cuts leave 50 active players in major league camp.

Briefly

Catcher Jair Camargo went 2 for 2 with a walk, a double and a home run in Wednesday’s exhibition game. Camargo, who is on the 40-man roster, is expected to begin the season in Triple-A but would be the first call should something happen to Ryan Jeffers or Christian Vázquez. … The Twins will have Thursday off before returning to action Friday to take on the Pittsburgh Pirates in Bradenton, Fla. Baldelli, father to 2-year-old Louisa and 5-month-old twins Nino and Enzo, said he planned to spend his day “playing with babies.”

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By Lindsey Bahr, Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — With just a few days to go until the 96th Academy Awards on Sunday, the show’s producers are feeling good about what they’ve put together.

The nominees are some of the best the Oscars have seen, including some true blockbusters like “Oppenheimer” and “Barbie.” Ryan Gosling is singing “I’m Just Ken” during the show. There will be a live orchestra in the theater. And the ever-reliable Jimmy Kimmel is back to host the proceedings for the fourth time.

Oscar statuettes are displayed during the Governors Ball press preview for the 96th Academy Awards, Tuesday, March 5, 2024, in Los Angeles. The Academy Awards will be held on Sunday, March 10. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)

“We’re really excited about this year,” said Molly McNearney, who is executive producing the show for the fourth time. “It’s a phenomenal year of movies. And we have great movies that the home audience is familiar with, which makes our jobs easier.”

The producers were hired earlier than usual, meaning they’ve had more time to plan and study past Oscars broadcasts to try to home in on what works and what doesn’t. One thing they’ve learned is that if the room is laughing, the audience at home is usually laughing too.

McNearney, who is married to Kimmel, said that they’re focusing on jokes over big, highly produced comedy bits. Kimmel will do his 10-minute monologue to kick off the show and will be sprinkled throughout.

Junghoon Pak presents a chocolate statue during the Governors Ball press preview for the 96th Academy Awards, Tuesday, March 5, 2024, in Los Angeles. The Academy Awards will be held on Sunday, March 10. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)

“I think an evening that just makes people feel good is a win,” McNearney said. “Our job as producers is to keep that feeling good moving quickly because it is a long show and we want to make sure people are staying throughout.”

Another thing that works: When the speeches are good and people feel invested in the winners. Last year there were a lot of great comeback and underdog stories, from Brendan Fraser to Ke Huy Quan, which helped. This is not something the producers have any control over, but they are optimistic about the nominees and setting up scenarios with presenters who have a genuine connection either with each other or people in the audience.

“We want everybody to feel included, that they are part of our story,” said executive producer and showrunner Raj Kapoor. “I hope that we have put another kind of modern take on it that really focuses on storytelling and connection and that the audience in the theater and at home will just feel immersed in the experience all throughout the evening.”

Crew members prepare the red carpet area on Wednesday, March 6, 2024, for Sunday’s 96th Academy Awards at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

Kapoor noted that the live performances of the Oscar-nominated original songs should be a real highlight of the show too, from the Osage singers to Gosling. They’ve also re-designed the stage so that an orchestra of 42 musicians can be in the Dolby Theatre and seen on camera. And Kapoor teased that the In Memoriam sequence is something they’ve put a lot of time and thought into and that it is poised to tug at audience heartstrings.

“There’s going to be entertainment and lots of surprises and a few cameos and things that haven’t been announced yet. We’re just really excited for everybody to come watch with us,” Katy Mullan said. “The Oscars is one of those last giant tentpole pop culture moments that everybody looks forward to and gathers around that TV set. It’s co-viewing at its best. And we’re in this moment where there’s more interest around these big live moments than there has been in years.”

Their main concern at the moment is that the global audience remembers that the broadcast begins an hour earlier than normal, at 7 p.m. EDT. It’s also the first day of daylight saving time.

“I think people are going to bed earlier and people are very excited, hopefully, that it’s starting at 7,” Mullan said. “It won’t be so late for everyone hanging on for the best picture announcement.”

The 96th Oscars will be broadcast live on ABC from the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on March 10 with the pre-show beginning at 6:30 p.m. EDT.