WINONA, Minn. – A group of kids, perhaps college age, kicked down a mannequin at the Target retail store. They video-taped themselves doing it, then suddenly dispersed. Store detectives reported the vandalism to police about 1:55 p.m. Police began monitoring social media platforms in hope of identifying the culprits. Target estimated the irreparably maimed mannequin’s value at $400.

LAKEVILLE, Minn. — Two persons were aboard a light helicopter that crashed Saturday near the Airlake Airport, authorities confirmed. Both died. So far only the identity of the pilot has been determined — Dave Schmitz, age 82, a grocer from Spooner,Wisconsin,   100 miles away. Friends in Spooner said Schmitz was an aviation enthusiast who learned flying in the military in the Vietnam war. In Spooner he co-founded the T6 Thunder flight team. He enjoyed fly-overs at community events. It was believed he was on a T6 Thunder flight when he crashed. He was largely retired from Schmitz’s Economart, a family busines since 1937.

Earlier: No survivors in Lakeville helicopter crash

WINONA, Minn. — A Winona woman said her boyfriend beat and choked her because he felt she was carousing too much without him. Brady Axel Anderson, age 30, was arrested at his house on Quarry Hill Road off U.S. 14 up Stockton Hill. His 24-year-old girlfriend said she had called him to pick her up at a Wisconsin bar about 1:05 a.m. On the way back to Winona over the Highway 43 bridge, she said, Anderson put a hand over her mouth and slapped her face, then veered intentionally into orange road constriction barrels to scare her. The assault became worse, she said: He squeezed her face and choked her. She got out and set off on foot. She delayed notifying police until 11:15 a.m. Anderson was charged with assault causing fear and injury and also strangulation.

Anderson. Upset their social lives were becoming incompatible, she said.

MELROSE, Wis.  —  A driver was killed when he was ejected from a car as it crashed into a tree south of Melrose on State Highway 71. The victim’s name was withheld by Jackson County authorities pending notification of family. The accident was about 1:10 a.m. near Cabin Avenue between Melrose and Four Corners.

BLACK RIVVER FALLS, Wis. —Deputies found fentanyl and drug paraphernalia in a car during a traffic stop in the city and arrested the driver and his passenger. Mathew Hair, age 38, and Summer Copeland, age 26, showed signs of impairment, deputies said. Both have addresses in Boyd, which is 55 miles north. The arrests were about 9:10 p.m. Deputies said that Hair admitted to taking fentanyl and meth and failed a roadside sobriety test. It was his sixth impaired driving arrest, records showed. Copeland also was charged with possessing drugs, as well as violating probation and bail-jumping.

Tennis (men): UW-LaCrosse 5, Milwaukee Engineering 2

Tennis (women): UW-LaCrosse 5, Milwaukee Engineering 0

WINONA, Minn.  — A Minnesota City man was arrested drunk at the Prairie Island campground after being reported all over the road coming off the Highway 43 bridge into Winona. The blood-alcohol level of Alfonso Cruz Sanchez, age 33, tested at 0.15%, the arresting deputy said. The allowable max is 0.08%. Sanchez also was charged with driving with a revoked license.

Sanchez. Drunk driving charged. Also no valid license to drive.

MINNESOTA CITY, Minn. – Deputies shot and killed a raccoon showing symptoms of rabies. This was about 6:50 p.m. on off Bridge Street .

WINONA, Minn. — A Winona man, in trouble after a disturbance in a residential neighborhood, admitted to being high on meth, police said. The admission was at the hospital after police arrested Carter Stephen Briggs, 23, and transported him with difficulty to the emergency room for evaluation. After the hospital Briggs was jailed on charges of disorderly conduct and interfering with police. The incident began about 6:40 p.m. with a call to police from Johnson and Mill streets — a traditional residential neighborhood between Sarnia Street and Lake Park. A neighbor reported Briggs on the sidewalk yelling hysterically for no apparent reason. He then stumbled and fell, blaming the neighbor’s dog for biting him. The neighbor said there was no dog bite. When police arrived, Briggs was on his porch – shirtless and shoeless and with grass stains. Police described him as jittery and defensive and pulling off a scab and handing it to an officer. Brigg was taken with resistance to a squad car. He kicked a car panel an an officer. At the hospital the officers strapped Briggs to a wheelchair after he attempted to get up and run away.

Briggs. Charges: Disorderly conduct, interfering with  police.

WINONA, Minn. — A Milwaukee man visiting an ex-girlfriend in Winona was arrested after a 911 emergency call to a police dispatcher went suddenly dead. The dispatcher traced the call to an Orrin Street apartment. Officers found a young woman with scrapes and cuts. The Milwaukee man at the address, Sylvere Peore Campbell, 23, acknowledged there had been an argument but said it never became physical. The woman, however, said she was choked twice, thrown down a flight of stairs, and pushed against a wall. Her shirt was ripped. She had scrapes on a leg and her back, and a bleeding lip. Campbell, police said, was intoxicated. This was about 2:30 p.m. in the 250 block of Orrin Street. The woman declined medical attention.

Campbell. Charged with domestic assault causing fear, injury. Also strangulation.

JACKSON, Wyo. — Authorities believe they found a Minnesota man missing since June 2024 while kayaking alone across Jackson Lake in Grandt Teton National Park. The body was pulled from 420 deep. Wesley Dopkins, age 43, of St. Paul, had been paddling from Elk Island to Waterfalls Canyon on the west shore. His foldable kayak, paddle and dry bag were found floating soon after he disappeared. At the time a search using a helicopter, boats, ground teams and dogs did not find any sign of him. A cause of death was not determined immediately. Hypothermia sets in quickly in the 27,000-acre lake, which is 6,700 feet above sea level and fed by snowfields.

Dopkins. Positive identification soon.

Firmly against censorship.  No book-burning either. The well-read Edwierdo is no light paperweight, body-pressing on top of a couple volumes to keep them from confiscation in this East Burns Valley household. In an exclusive interview Edwierdo said he wants to live in a more purrfect world where banning books and restricting access to truthful information is simply impawsible. Image: Andy Frank

LACROSSE, Wis. — Mayor Shaundel Washington-Spivey has closed two city Parks where homeless people congregate. The closures will allow thorough clean-up, the mayor said. Temporarily closed with no target for re-opening:

> Cameron Park. A 1.5-acre downtown park at Fourth and King streets. Known for hosting farmers markets.

> Burns Park. A downtown green space at 703 Main Street with a playground and chess tables. Also a farmers market site.

Mayor Washington-Spivey said it would be simplistic to blame homeless people alone. “The reality is more complex,” he said. “Both sheltered and unsheltered individuals have contributed to behaviors that compromise the safety and integrity of these public spaces.”  Problems include drugs, violence, and “other inappropriate conduct,” he said.

Earlier: LaCrosse Council to homeless: Go elsewhere

Earlier: Homeless relocate but told again to leave

Earlier: LaCrosse clamps down further on homeless camping

Earlier: Homeless ordered out of LaCrosse park

DRESBACH, Minn. — Sheriff’s deputies haven’t quite sorted out some nasty roadside confrontations involving several women after dark. The women, all   uncooperative, wouldn’t explain to deputies what was going on. This much is known:

7:38 p.m.: A motorist reported two women engaged in a heavy confrontation outside a car along Highway 61 in Homer. This was just south of Winona at County Road 15. The car was gone when a deputy arrived, but one of the women was standing there stranded. She was drunk and was uncooperative, refusing to explain what happened, the deputy said. The 22-year-old woman insisted on being left alone, but the deputy couldn’t leave her on the busy highway because of her level of intoxication. After almost an hour of the deputy coaxing the woman about who to contact to take her home, she said to try her mother in LaCrescent. The deputy called the mother, 28 miles away, and offered to drive the woman home. The woman resisted getting into the squad car and pushed the deputy off balance. Later, he said, he chose to spare her an assault charge and just wanted to get her to her mother.

Grassman. Her night ended badly — in jail. Still mum on why everyone so angry.

9:18 p.m.; The same deputy ran across two vehicles on a shoulder at the U.S. Highway 61 fork off Interstate 90. One vehicle matched the description of the one from Homer 1-1/2 hours earlier. The women, outside their cars, were yelling and screaming at each other and exchanging blows. As the deputy pulled up, one vehicle sped off. The remaining women, still angry, refused to explain any of their behavior.

Moments later. The deputy received a radioed report that the fleeing car had crashed in a ditch not far away on I-90. No one was injured. The driver, Shawna Lee Grassman, age 35, of Sparta, Wisconsin, was booked at the Winona County jail. The charge: Driving while impaired. She was as mum as all the other women about the night’s events.

ZUMBROTA, Minn. — A Blaine woman and a 3-year-old boy, both belted, escaped serious jury when their car lost control and came to a stop in the ditch. This was about 5:15 p.m. south of Zumbrota on four-lane U.S. Highway 52 at State Highway 60. Renee Marie Wilson, age 60, and the boy were treated 24 miles away at the Cannon Falls hospital. They were headed north toward the Twin Cities in a 2007 Toyota Prius.

WINONA, Minn. — A Winona man who police said was drunk and asleep in his parked car was arrested for driving drunk, although, once awakened, he denied it. Taken into custody was Rayshun Boller, 44. He had been arrested for drunken driving three times before and his license to drive had been revoked, police said. At first he told police he had been dropped off by someone else in the 500 block of West Fifth Street, where the car was parked. A witness said it wasn’t so, police said. Also, police said, surveillance video showed Boller driving. They reported signs of impairment: Blood-shot and watery eyes, slurred speech and imbalance, Boller refused to perform field sobriety exercises and also a breath test for his blood-alcohol level. At jail a blood draw was taken and sent to an outside lab for evaluation.

Boller. Alone in car with key in ignition, said officers.

BLAIR, Wis. — Two persons from nearby Taylor were injured when their vehicle struck a front-loader that deputies said pulled out in front of them. The injured driver, Christion Warner, 26, was trapped inside and needed to be extricated by first-responders. Injured too was Christina Williams, 26, his passenger. They were taken to a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The accident was about 5:40 p.m. near South River and Rabbit Run roads between Blair and Taylor. Driving the front-leader driver was Mitchell Mills. Deputies said his vision was blocked by a tree as he started across the road to an entrance to the Hi-Crush frac sand mine, now owned by Smart Sand of Pennsylvania.

ST. CHARLES, Minn. — A Wisconsin driver who had been reported all over the road was arrested at the Love’s truck stop. Deputies said his blood-alcohol level, at 0.15%, was nearly twice the legal limit. Taken to jail 28 miles away in Winona was Joshua Nicholas Rodriguez, age 38, of Vernona. The charge: Driving while alcohol-impaired. This was about 3:50 p.m.