ROCHESTER, Minn. – Guns drawn police swarmed the Rogan’s shoe store in northwest Rochester. There had been a 911 call from a man claiming that he had shot someone in the face. Nobody in the store knew anything about it, although they said there had been a man acting strange in the store. Here’s what happened, according to the criminal complaint:
> James Nelson, 39, of Mazeppa, used his cell phone to call 911 that he had shot someone. He said he would be waiting outside in his car.
> Police called the store and told clerks and customers to shelter in place until they could get there. They took refuge in an office and rear aisles.
> Outside the store police spotted a car matching the description given by the caller. No one was inside.
> Clerks identified a man sheltering in place with them as having been acting odd. Police asked the man for his cell phone number and tapped it onto one of their phones. Nelson’s phone rang right there in the spot..
> The gig up, the man admitted making the call. “A joke,” he said.
The cops weren’t laughing. They took Nelson to jail and began paperwork for a felony count of threatening violence and a gross misdemeanor charge of a 911 hoax. This was all about 11 a.m.
Nelson. Merely in town shoe-shopping?
