Nichole Rice acquitted

The Anita Knutson cold case had been in the national spotlight on and off during the nearly 15 years between her murder and the arrest of Nichole Rice in March 2022. State and national media descended on Grand Forks in March where the jury returned a verdict of not guilty after a seven day trial.

The case had been transferred out of Ward County after prospective juror questionnaires determined it would be difficult if not impossible to assemble an impartial jury due to the years of exposure the Knutson case has had in Minot and the surrounding community.

With the state’s case being largely based on circumstantial and hearsay evidence from a former boyfriend and friend of Rice’s who testified she had confessed to them years before while intoxicated, the jury was swayed by defense attorney Richard Sand’s closing arguments that the state had not proven its case beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Delon Davis leaves Courtroom 302 at the Ward County Courthouse on Aug. 21 after being sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for the murder of Mark Ramon McMillan.

Sand further argued the investigation and the testimony related to it was riddled with inconsistencies and said the witnesses who testified about her alleged statements were inspired by their viewing of a true crime investigative series called “Cold Justice,” which Sand contended steered investigators toward Rice over other compelling suspects.

“Nichole didn’t do this. The killer is out there, and it needs to be solved, but it won’t be solved here because the work wasn’t done,” Sand said during his closing arguments. “They just went through all these slides, hundreds of elements that have to work perfectly for them for this case to work for them. One of those elements falls out of place, this case doesn’t work.”

The jubilant reaction from the defense to the not guilty verdict went viral in the aftermath, and inspired some outraged reactions. Among the reactions was that of Anita Knutson’s sister Anna Knutson-Toedter.

“I spent the last week reliving some of the hardest parts of the last 18 years of my life, and in those 18 years one thing I’ve learned is that a not guilty verdict does not mean innocence. I cannot say the same for many of the people in that room, but my conscience is clear,” Knutson-Toedter’s social media post said.

The Sand Law firm would release a statement on April 1 apologizing to the Knutson family and all those who were offended.

Daniel Breijo, charged in the death of Nicholas Van Pelt, waits for the courtroom to clear.

“What the courtroom cameras didn’t see were our daily group prayers alongside our client’s family, emotional conversations, and our team standing by as our client and her daughter said their goodbyes prior to the verdict being read. Justice would not have been served by convicting the wrong person,” the statement read.

Then Interim Minot Police Chief Dale Plessas released a statement regarding the verdict on March 27, extending sympathy to Anita Knutson’s family while also respecting the jury’s verdict. Plessas further indicated that in light of the not guilty verdict, there were no further developments that the MPD can comment on regarding the future of the case.

“However, as with any unsolved case, we remain open to reviewing any new credible information that may come forward,” Plessas’ statement concluded.

Strange case of Daniel Breijo

For much of 2025, the case against Daniel Breijo remained mostly quiet apart from a trial scheduled to commence in October. However, in September, it was up in the air whether the case would even go before a jury at all, after the state and the defendant filed a stipulated plea agreement that would have reduced the Class AA murder count against Breijo to Class B felony manslaughter.

Breijo is charged with shooting Nicholas Van Pelt to death on Christmas Eve 2023 and leaving a surviving female victim with serious, permanent injuries. Special Ward County State’s Attorney Amanda Engelstad defended the plea agreement at a hearing on Sept. 4, saying it had been reached after extensive conversations with Van Pelt’s family and with the detectives investigating the case.

Engelstad said the victim’s family would like to see a conclusion in the case, citing unwanted attention and private family images of Van Pelt’s funeral being used in a documentary series produced by BEK TV.

The series explored Breijo’s case and his alleged involvement in allegations connected to a $1.8 billion federal civil rights lawsuit filed against five former and current North Dakota Department of Commerce officials, involving a former defense and aerospace parts factory in Dusneith. The victim, identified as J.B. in court records, made multiple appearances in the series, during which she shared her narrative of the incident and advanced other speculations.

“They would like finality to this. They know in the plea agreement there is finality. They know there is no certainty in front of a jury. They are in full agreement in moving forward in this capacity,” Englestad said.

According to the stipulated factual bases filed with the court, Breijo allegedly left his residence on Dec. 24, 2023, with his firearm and went to a local establishment that served alcohol to watch a football game before he was picked up by Van Pelt and J.B. to spend Christmas Eve at Van Pelt’s residence.

According to the document, Breijo continued to allegedly consume alcohol to the point of extreme inebriation before the shooting, and a toxicology analytical report filed in the case found he had a blood alcohol concentration of 0.279 almost five hours after the shooting occurred. According to the parties, two different experts determined Breijo’s BAC at the time of the shooting was between .325 and .465.

According to multiple sources, including an article published by the Cleveland Clinic, an individual with a BAC between 0.3 and 0.4 would likely have alcohol poisoning and experience a loss of consciousness. A BAC over 0.4 is considered potentially fatal, putting individuals at risk of coma and death from respiratory arrest.

Breijo’s attorney Jesse Walstad acknowledged the unidentified female victim in the case had filed a victim impact statement in opposition to the plea agreement but argued technically her statement only applied to the charges related to her.

District Court Judge Daniel El-Dweek ultimately ruled he would not accept the plea agreement “at this time.”

The parties jointly asked for the trial to be rescheduled. It is now set to commence in March 2026. The parties also requested a “pre”-presentence investigation to burnish the plea deal for El-Dweek to reconsider, citing his use of the words, “at this time.”

The road to the March trial date has been further complicated by the emergence of a subpoena filed by the state seeking to compel BEK TV to provide all unaired interview footage and associated documents and information related to the broadcaster’s interactions with J.B.

While BEK TV has sought to quash the subpoena citing North Dakota’s press shield law, the state and Breijo have both filed responses asking El-Dweek to deny the quash so the state can satisfy its requirements to provide any impeachment or exonerating information related to state witnesses.

Walstad claimed J.B. had “offered multiple contradictory statements during law enforcement interviews, her deposition, and aired segments of the BEK interviews.” Walstad argued a failure to disclose J.B. ‘s recorded interviews and related materials would result in a misapplication of the journalist shield statute and create a miscarriage of justice.

Walstad confronted the argument put forward by BEK TV in its motion to quash that the state could simply depose J.B. again, writing the central issue at stake is determining what contradictions and differences existed between her sworn deposition testimony and the statements given to BEK TV.

El-Dweek took the parties’ arguments under advisement after a virtual hearing held on Dec. 17.

‘Heartless’

Delon Davis, 47, was found guilty after a jury trial in May for the shooting death of Mark Ramon McMillan Jr. 36, Minot.

McMillan had been reported missing in March 2024 after falling out of contact with family members. After extensive outreach to the public and investigation by a number of authorities, police eventually located McMillan’s body in the basement of a barber shop in downtown Minot in July 2024. Davis, who was a manager of the establishment, was arrested several weeks later after investigators located evidence connecting Davis to McMillan’s death and disappearance that contradicted Davis’ version of the events.

Davis, a felon prohibited from owning or possessing a firearm, maintained he had acted in self defense when he took the stand at the trial, saying he fired the “shop gun” after McMillan and another man started firing first.

Testimony from a witness to the shooting and other evidence brought forward by law enforcement disputed Davis’ claims that a third individual representing a Mexican cartel had threatened him into hiding McMillan’s body.

On Aug. 21, District Court Judge Douglas Mattson, who has since retired, delivered one of his final sentences from the bench after the presentence investigation was completed. Deputy State’s Attorney Tiffany Sorgen requested a sentence of life without the possibility of parole, citing Davis lies to law enforcement throughout the search for McMillan and investigation of his death.

Davis made a statement accepting responsibility for the verdict, admitted he tampered with evidence and hid McMIllan’s body, but maintained he was not a danger or menace to society.

“I am sorry, and I do accept responsibility. I just ask you to look at those facts. I’m not heartless. But I really did believe I was protecting myself and my family because I was in fear of my life and theirs,” Davis said.

Sorgen responded saying she wasn’t sure how much more “heartless” his actions could have been, a sentiment shared by Mattson when he delivered his sentence of life without the possibility of parole.

“As judges, it’s not all too often I’m surprised as I am here today about one’s cruelty to another. This case makes the robe heavy to wear,” Mattson said.”I’ve had a period of time here on the bench. Like others involved in the criminal justice system in one manner or fashion, you see all kinds of things. This one takes the cake. I don’t doubt you’re sorry, but you were heartless.”

Guilty pleas

Two Minot murder cases were resolved through plea agreements in 2025, with Quantdre Mersier pleading guilty to the 2023 homicide of Ansu Kamara in May and Friling Hadley pleading guilty to the murder of Marslynn Augustine in December. 2024.

According to court documents, Minot Central Dispatch received a report shortly after 11 p.m. from Kamara’s roommate, who reported Kamara was shot and barely breathing. The roommate reported the shooter had run off.

After officers arrived, the roommate provided doorbell camera videos, which showed Kamara entering the residence when an unknown male ran at him with a gun. The video further showed the individual running into the closed door of the residence, before firing a shot in the door window and running off, according to the affidavit of probable cause.

Kamara was transported to a Minot hospital for treatment of a life-threatening brain injury caused by a bullet graze. Mersier was identified through still images captured from the doorbell camera videos.

Mersier was originally charged with attempted murder, but Kamara was declared deceased on Nov. 24, 2023, which resulted in the charge being elevated to murder. Mersier remained at large until he was arrested in April 2024 by the Fort Wayne Police Department and the U.S. Marshal Service in Indiana.

Mersier was sentenced to 50 years with the Department of Corrections, with all but 23 years suspended pending the completion of five years of supervised probation upon release. Mersier will not be eligible for release until he has served 23% of his sentence. Meriser appealed his conviction to the North Dakota Supreme Court, which affirmed his conviction after hearing oral arguments.

Hadley pleaded guilty to the Class AA felony murder count on April 11 and was sentenced to 30 years with the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation on Sept. 26. According to court documents, Hadley was arrested after Minot Police responded to a report of an unresponsive female in the early morning of Dec. 17, 2024. Officers arrived to find a male relative performing CPR on Augustine, who said Hadley was supposed to be waiting for the officers outside. The relative said Hadley had told him the victim had stopped breathing and fell out of a chair onto the floor, but Hadley simply watched him perform CPR without attempting life saving measures himself.

Hadley was eventually located and detained after being tracked down by a K-9 unit. According to court documents, responding officers observed marks on the victim that were indicative of manual strangulation and defensive markings.

2025 murders

The first shooting death of 2025 occurred in August with the death of Dorian Thomas, 19, who was found deceased from a gunshot to the head in northeast Minot. Jonathan DeCeoteau, 19, was charged with and eventually pleaded guilty to one count of Class B felony manslaughter and tampering with evidence. His sentencing has been scheduled for February.

The second shooting came two months later in October, when Rachael K. Foster, 43, was charged with murder in the shooting death of Lance D. Phillips, 38, in a southeast Minot apartment. She is being held on a $1 million bond.

Three individuals have been charged in connection with the third Minot murder of 2025, the fatal stabbing of Anthony William Redmond on Nov. 7: Choze Joran Morsette, Autumn Jade Rose Tincher and Cole Ronnie Brown. Morsette was originally arrested on Nov. 20 and charged with Redmond’s murder, but Tincher, Brown, and Morsette were all charged with one count of accomplice to murder on Nov. 29. All three are being held on $2 million cash or corporate surety bonds.

The Ward County State’s Attorney’s Office has indicated in court documents it intends to dismiss the murder count against Morsette in favor of the accomplice charge, but this had not occurred as of Dec. 19, based on court records, and both cases remain active.