CHESTER, Minn. — Deputies cornered a rural Chatfield man up a tree and talked him down after several hours of negotiations and arrested him for a bloody assault on the Mississippi River the afternoon before. The victim, Melissa Hunt of Wabasha, died of the wounds. Arrested was Craig Alan Hameister, age 45. The arrest was in a wooded area near a trailer park north of the east Rochester exurb of Chester, Hameister had been identified by Hunt as she was dying in a Wabasha hospital of major face wounds. Based on information from Wabasha, Rochester-based Olmsted Coumty deputies spotted Hameister’s white 2017 Chevrolet Silverado pickup abandoned, its door open, at a house outside of Chatfield. A woman at the house said Hameister had shown up “very frantic” and said that “something bad happened” and that the cops would be coming. Hameister rode off on a motorcycle. The woman said she then realized that her 9mm hand gun was missing. A shelter-in-place order was issued for Marion Township. Deputies back in Wabasha County, where the assault, occurred, were notified about the missing handgun, returned to the Mississippi River boat launch, where the assault had occurred, and retrieved an unspent round of ammunition. Meanwhile, Olmsted County deputies located Hameister near Chester — in the 6800 block of Meadowbrook Street Southeast in Marion Township .He fled into the woods. Deputies gave chase and spotted Hameister up a tree. Eventually they talked him and he surrendered without resistance. At the base of the tree, deputies said, was the missing 9mm hand gun.
Hameister. Initial charge: Second-degree murder.