Murder charges were added Monday in the case against a motorist who authorities say had a blood-alcohol level more than four times the legal limit to drive when he plowed into a St. Louis Park bar patio on Labor Day weekend, killing two people and injuring nine others.
The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office said video surveillance at Park Tavern supports two counts of third-degree murder against Steven Frane Bailey, 56, of St. Louis Park, for the killing of Kristina Folkerts and Gabriel Quinn Harvey just after 8 p.m. Sept. 1.
Folkerts, who died at the scene, was a 30-year-old mother of three children from St. Louis Park who was working as a server at the time of the crash.
Harvey, a 30-year-old from Rosemount, was a health unit coordinator at nearby Methodist Hospital. He was at the restaurant with several hospital workers celebrating a colleague’s last nursing shift. He died that night at Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis.
According to the attorney’s office, prosecutors did not yet have the surveillance video at the time of the original Sept. 3 charges, although references to the video were included in police reports.
Bailey still faces the previously filed charges of criminal vehicular homicide and criminal vehicular operation in connection with the crash.
Prosecutors often charge multiple counts if applicable to give a jury options or to use as bargaining tools during plea negotiations.
According to state statute, a person commits third-degree unintentional murder for “perpetrating an act eminently dangerous to others and evincing a depraved mind, without regard for human life.” The charge carries a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison, with a presumptive sentence between 10 to 15 years.
Four Methodist Hospital nurses were among the injured. Two remained hospitalized in satisfactory condition on Monday, while the others had been discharged.
Five other victims suffered minor injuries.
Prosecutors: He hit two cars first, sped away
According to the amended criminal complaint, the surveillance video shows Bailey’s BMW turn right from Louisiana Avenue onto Oak Leaf Court and turn right into the near-capacity Park Tavern parking lot. Several people were walking in the area, and other motorists were driving in the parking lot.
The video shows that Bailey would have had a clear view of the patio from the time he pulled into the lot and throughout his course of travel.
Bailey passed several parked cars and stopped briefly after passing an empty parking space on his passenger side. He then backed up and hit a parked car with the rear end of his car. Within seconds, Bailey can be seen on video accelerating at a high rate of speed in what appears to be an attempt to flee the scene, according to the attorney’s office.
As he accelerated through the parking lot, a black SUV turned into the area where Bailey was headed. He appeared to swerve slightly in an attempt to avoid the SUV. He hit the SUV’s rear driver’s side without slowing down and continued to accelerate straight toward the patio.
Bailey then accelerated past 11 parking spaces and plowed through a metal fence and into the patio seating area, striking occupied tables and multiple people. He continued to drive “all the way through the full length of the patio without braking” and did not slow down until his car “came to an abrupt and violent halt” when it hit several boulders and the base of a steep incline.
When police arrived, Bailey was still in his SUV. As officers approached him they reportedly heard him on the phone saying, “I hit the gas instead of the brake and went right through a thing” and “I’m probably going to jail,” according to the charges.
Bailey “appeared calm but was slow to respond to officers’ directions … (his) speech was slurred, and his eyes were bloodshot and watery. As he exited the vehicle, (Bailey) was unsteady on his feet and fell to his knees.”
He made several “spontaneous” statements such as saying when he was told they were going to perform a field sobriety test, “You don’t need to do fields. I know what I did.”
A preliminary breath test showed his blood-alcohol content was 0.325. The legal limit to drive in Minnesota is 0.08.
Prior DWIs
Court records show that Bailey has five previous drunken driving convictions, the latest being a third-degree gross misdemeanor DWI in Hennepin County in 2015.
Bailey remains jailed in lieu of $1 million bail without conditions, or $500,000 with conditions. He’s scheduled to return to court for an Oct. 1 hearing.
Bailey’s attorney, Tom Sieben, did not respond to a request Monday for comment on the new charges.