A convicted murderer is accused of murder again — this time of his pregnant wife in her St. Paul apartment.

As he fled the homicide, Mychel A. Stowers, 36, also carjacked a man and shot him in the leg, according to criminal charges filed Thursday.A nationwide warrant is out for Stowers’ arrest and police are asking anyone who sees him to call 911.

Stowers is charged with killing Damara Alexis Kirkland, 35, and her unborn child on Saturday in the North End.

He’s been out of prison since March in the 2008 killing of a man in St. Paul. He was on work release, and the Minnesota Department of Corrections says he was under supervision by their agency and a halfway house.

At 9:08 p.m. Saturday, officers were sent to an apartment on Sycamore Street between Jackson and Agate streets. Residents said they thought they’d heard gunshots from an apartment. An officer found Kirkland lying on the floor of the apartment’s spare bedroom, and St. Paul Fire Department medics pronounced her dead at the scene.

There were five shell casings on the bedroom floor.

Officers noted ultrasound photos in Kirkland’s apartment and an autopsy found she was eight to nine weeks pregnant, according to a criminal complaint filed. Kirkland had been shot three times.

Homicide is a leading cause of death during pregnancy, national research has shown. At least nine women in Minnesota were killed while pregnant due to domestic violence between 2012 and 2022, Violence Free Minnesota found in a study.

“If somebody already is experiencing domestic violence before pregnancy, they’re inherently at greater risk” of violence during pregnancy, “but there are also cases where there may not have been any history of violence until the victim became pregnant,” said Meggie Royer, Violence Free Minnesota communications senior manager. “… It’s really about power and control in these cases.”

Help for victims of domestic violence is available through the Day One hotline by calling 866-223-1111 or texting 612-399-9995.

Bullet casings at carjacking and homicide are linked

At 9:14 p.m. Saturday, near the apartment, officers responded to Acker Street near Jackson Street about a carjacking. A man had shot a 26-year-old in his leg and stolen his car. The gunman also fired at a man standing by the car, but missed, said the complaint charging Stowers in that case.

Preliminary analysis shows the same gun fired the casings found by police at both the apartment and the carjacking location, the complaint said.

Kirkland and Stowers married in December 2021 and he filed for divorce at the end of June, according to a court file. The matter was ongoing.

Stowers was living in a halfway house during his work release, and was granted a pass “to visit his ex-wife” on Saturday, the complaint said.

A person who heard gunshots Saturday reported seeing a heavyset man running away about a minute after the shots.

The Ramsey County Attorney’s Office charged Stowers with intentional second-degree murder, not premeditated, of Kirkland, and second-degree murder of an unborn child.

St. Paul police ask anyone with information about Stowers’ whereabouts to call the homicide unit at 651-266-5650. He is described as a Black man who is 5 feet 9 inches tall and 240 pounds with brown eyes. He’s been known to wear glasses.

The car that Stowers is accused of taking in the carjacking was found in a parking lot in the 1900 block of St. Clair Avenue in St. Paul early Thursday.

Past murder case in St. Paul

Stowers and two other men were charged in 2008 with the Feb. 11, 2008, shooting of 20-year-old Antonio Sims in a restaurant parking lot at Fry Street and University Avenue in St. Paul.

One of the suspects said Sims was supposed to sell them some marijuana, but there was an altercation. Stowers, then 20, was accused of being the shooter.

He pleaded guilty to second-degree intentional murder without premeditation and was sentenced in July 2008 to a prison term of 25½ years. Most people sentenced to prison in Minnesota serve two-thirds of their sentence in prison and the remainder on supervised release.

The Minnesota Department of Corrections has a work release program for the last 12 months before a supervised release date. Stowers met criteria, applied and was approved, according to Aaron Swanum, a DOC spokesman.

Anyone on work release is supervised by a DOC agent, and the halfway house or jail where they’re housed handles day-to-day supervision and on-site case management, Swanum said.